A Young Man of Questionable Morality
by pipistrelle
Summary: Theodore had never told anyone why he could see Thestrals until now, and with good reason. It was an event that would shape his entire life, at Hogwarts and beyond.
1. Harry & Theodore I

_"They were the bearers of glamorous names that weighed upon them like physical infirmities. They appeared stunted and immature, although their eyes were old. Already as young children they were versed in irony. Rarely were they surprised by cruelty, including their own, but they could be moved to helpless tears by simple acts of kindness, generosity." _

**Joyce Carol Oates, _Blonde_.**

"My parents' marriage was one of convenience. That is not to say that they were not fond of each other, but they were under no illusions that they had been brought together by passion. He was already old when they got married, and much older than she was. He recognized this as his last chance to preserve the Nott line. She was intelligent and plain, and therefore repeatedly passed over for marriage proposals by younger, more eligible pure-bloods. And a pure-blood her husband would have to be: her parents would not consent to anything less. When the first blush of her youth had faded and all her friends had married and begun having children and she had almost given up hope, my father started showing her attention. He did this shyly at first, afraid that she was embarrassed by his affections but too polite to tell him so, but when it became clear that not only she but her entire family were delighted, he was emboldened, and finally he proposed to her.

"My mother was killed by Aurors before the Dark Lord's first fall. Though her politics were almost as rigid as my father's, she was not a Death Eater. On the night of her death my father was away; she was alone in the house with me. I like to picture her wandering around our crumbling manor (but she wouldn't have let it reach the state of dilapidation my father would later let it get to, not her) with me on her hip, listening to the wind. But you of all people must know what it's like, scanning back through the darkest recesses of memory, trying to dredge up a picture of someone who died before you could even talk. I imagine her holding me, singing to me, folding me into the soft-smelling blankets of my cot. And then… some curse-happy Auror itching to kill, desperate to even out the tally of losses burst in.

"Sorry, I didn't mean… I'm sure you're much too professional for that. But nobody really knows what happened that night. The Aurors in question swore blind that they had acted exactly as the information they had received dictated. It was partly this confusion that allowed my father, one of the oldest and first Death Eaters, to escape punishment. This was aided by the sympathy people felt for him over his wife's death, and for the infant son she left behind. Later, much later, I looked up the transcripts of my father's trial, and as far as I can tell, he pinned as many of his crimes as he could on other people and mentioned me and my mother at every opportunity.

"Were we close, my father and I? Well, we the only family left to one another. We had similar tastes, I suppose, and we would often sit reading together on the threadbare sofas of the drawing room, but I never really understood what animated him, what made him devote himself so unreservedly to the Dark Lord. And yet…you would understand, wouldn't you, if I said I loved my father because he was my father. As though my affection for him was no more than filial obligation. But it wasn't that. I didn't just love my father. I _liked _him too. And I wanted him to like me. He was clever and cynical, qualities I admired and tried to foster within myself. Maybe I succeeded in creating this impression among my peers, but my father did not treat me with the seriousness I craved; he simply indulged me as one would any precocious child.

"But after the fourth year at Hogwarts, nothing was the same. You emerged from the Triwizard maze with Cedric Diggory's dead body claiming to have witnessed the Dark Lord's return, and while most people refused to believe him simply out of fear, I knew it was true. Unlike many Death Eaters my father had not believed the Dark Lord to be dead, but had assumed that the Dark Lord's return to power would not take place within his lifetime. But that evening I knew that everything had changed: the Dark Lord had ceased to be a spectre.

"I won't say that his return showed a side of my father that had previously been hidden, more that it drew out a strain of cruelty of which I had already been aware, but had not had cause to ponder in great depth. I knew my father had been a Death Eater. I knew that the Death Eaters had murdered, blackmailed, tortured. If my father had hastened the deaths of a few Muggles and blood traitors, I did not care. They were nameless, faceless, hypothetical. Of course blood must be shed to uphold the purity of wizarding lineage. That's just how it works. Concede this, and you have to acknowledge that someone must do the shedding. So yes, if not the full details, I did know the essence of my father's involvement with the Death Eaters, and I accepted it.

"When I came home for the holidays, my father seemed extremely agitated. He had been, after all, one of the longest serving Death Eaters to avoid Azkaban and I wondered whether the Dark Lord had forgiven him, or was making him do some form of penance. My father would often go out without telling me where he was going, sometimes for days on end. This was fine by me as long as he left an adequate supply of reading material and Floo powder. I would go to London on my own sometimes, more to break the routine of home life than for any specific purpose, where I would wander up and down the bustling shop fronts of Diagon Alley. Eating a pumpkin butterscotch sundae outside Florean Fortescue's and watching the relaxed, unconcerned faces of shoppers strolling past, it felt as though I was the only one who knew our world was different. But while the Daily Prophet did what it could to blacken your name and dismiss your account as lunacy or lies, the Dark Lord silently gathered an army."

Nott lapses into silence for a moment. His gaze is unblinking, unnerving, although he seems reluctant to look directly at me. Instead, his eyes travel around my office, taking in the scattered heaps of files from the Auror Office, the bin overflowing with Chocolate Frog wrappers and plastic coffee cups, the framed photograph of Ginny trying to hold a hyperactive eighteen-month-old James. He seems particularly struck by this reminder of domesticity amid the piled evidence of my busy work life, but whether his reaction is one of envy or simple curiosity, I can't tell. I know that his life has been an exceptionally lonely one; that is how he has ended up coming to me, after all. He said, when he came in, that he had not slept in days, which I believe, looking at the rings under his pink-rimmed eyes. He looks a lot older than twenty five, although the uncertainty and self-consciousness of his manner reminds me of a shy teenager. He seems both restless and weary; I can imagine him pacing some rundown bedsit in north London through the night, thinking. Because he knows the potential consequences of his being here as well as I do. He seems freed by what he's already told me, happier, lighter, and yet he must know that my job is to collect evidence, not offer absolution. Even though he's already given me enough to start the procedure for a criminal trial before the Wizengamot, I let him keep talking.


	2. Draco

The oaf was back. I'd been thinking I might actually do all right in my Care of Magical Creatures O.W.L. if I had a decent teacher, but of course they sent Grubbly-Plank packing as soon as the oaf returned. The Gryffindors all had to pretend to be pleased at this – they always stick by their own – but I exchanged dark looks with Crabbe and Goyle.

"Manticores today, you reckon?"

A few people laughed bitterly. But then, to my horror, the oaf grinned and started leading us off to the Forbidden Forest.

"We're workin' in here today," he beamed idiotically. "Bit more sheltered! Anyway, they prefer the dark."

"What prefers the dark?" I said in alarm. This was bloody typical. The whole class was about to be fed to some monster and, as usual, I was the only one who seemed even remotely bothered. "What did he say prefers the dark – did you hear?"

"Ready? Right, well, I've bin savin' a trip inter the forest fer yer fifth year. Thought we'd go an' see these creatures in their natural habitat. Now what we're studyin' today is pretty rare, I reckon I'm probably the on'y person in Britain who's managed ter train 'em."

This was not what I wanted to hear. It was obviously going to be something horrible. The way he deludes himself into thinking he can control these monsters – it'd almost be funny, if our lives weren't at risk.

"And you're sure they're trained are you?" I demanded incredulously. "Only it wouldn't be the first time you'd brought dangerous stuff to class, would it?" Even the Gryffindors had to give me that. The oaf's a danger to us all, yet Dumbledore turns a blind eye to everything he does. Breeding those ghastly Blast-Ended Skrewts was _illegal_ and he _still_ got away with it, even when it was reported in the press, and the Hippogriff that savaged me neatly disappears and no-one thinks they need look into it any further.

"Course they're trained,"

"What happened to your face, then?" The bruising on his face is so bad that it makes his face look like a bowl of rotten fruit, yet he's expecting us to line up for the same thing.

"Mind yer own business! Now, if yeh've finished askin' stupid questions, follow me!"

I was more than half inclined just to stay there, as indeed was everyone else, but after Potter, Weasley and Granger followed the oaf into the Forest, the rest of us didn't really have a choice. Thinking that my testimony could come in handy were the Wizengamot ever to try the oaf for criminal negligence (resulting in the deaths of foolhardy Gryffindors and unfortunate Slytherins) I followed the rest of the class into the Forest.

"Gather roun', gather roun'. Now, they'll be attracted by the smell o' the meat but I'm goin' ter give 'em a call anyway, 'cause they'll like to know it's me." The oaf threw down the stinking cow carcass in a small clearing and whistled.

Nothing happened.

Trying to suppress the thought that whatever beast the oaf was planning to feed us to was silently preparing to pounce on us where we stood, I suddenly saw the carcass moving. He's bred an invisible monster, I thought in a sudden panic. He's probably crossed a Quintaped with a Demiguise. Our chests will be hacked open before we can take another breath and I am the only one who can see it coming. I watched the carcass in trepidation, waiting for it to stop shaking, signaling the beginning of the bloodbath. But it kept moving; bits of meat were just breaking off and disappearing. We were all watching the carcass now. I looked around at other people to see if they were preparing to make a dash for it if needs be, and noticed something. Potter could see the thing. He wasn't looking at the carcass; his eyes were definitely fixed on a point above and to the side of it. And then I noticed it wasn't just Potter; Theodore Nott and Longbottom could see it too. What was this beast that some could see and others couldn't?

Then, it clicked. I'd known that they lived in the grounds, as the school governors had had had several complaints about them; a lot of wizarding families find them too sinister to be around children, despite the fact that most kids can't see them. Thestrals.

Theodore could see them? I'd had no idea. I've known him a long time; longer, probably, than anyone else here. I've known him so long that I still think of him as Theodore even though we started referring to each other by our surnames when we got to Hogwarts, as one does in Slytherin. But I wouldn't say that I knew him, not really. He's one of those people who will talk to you without disclosing anything about himself, and even though you could be living in the same dormitory for years you still feel as though you don't know them any better than you did the first night at Hogwarts. I wondered who it was he's seen die. Maybe most people would probably think that it was his mother, but I didn't; he would only have been about a year old when she died. No, it must have been someone else. Who though? Best not to ask, if he doesn't volunteer the information. There's no telling what he might have seen. His father is, after all, a Death Eater like mine, and he doesn't have my mother poking her nose in and making sure her precious baby doesn't hear too much. Not that I envy the loss of a parent of course, but sometimes I honestly think my mother reckons I'm about five.

The oaf surveyed the class and said, "Now…put yer hands up, who can see 'em?"

Nott raised his hand half-heartedly along with Longbottom and Potter.

"Yeah…yeah, I knew you'd be able ter, Harry. An' you too, Neville eh? An' –"

I had to do something. I was absolutely convinced that there was a good reason Nott had never mentioned anything and that unless I interrupted people were going to start wondering how this Slytherin son of a Death Eater had seen death, which would then lead to awkward questions. We all have family secrets; Nott, Crabbe, Goyle and I, we all know we will be expected to take our fathers' places alongside the Dark Lord. I didn't need to know the specifics, because the texture of our family life has been the same. We stand by each other, unconditionally. I still don't think he knows what I did for him.

"Excuse me," I said loudly, "but what exactly are we supposed to be seeing?" 

_A/N: Review please? I have been working on this story for ages and have amassed about 17000+ words (scarily, it's now longer than my Master's dissertation) which I want to edit and tweak until it's the best it can be. A lot of the chapters are only half-written, if that, so feedback along the way would be much appreciated…_


	3. Harry & Theodore II

"I'm going to be honest with you," Nott says.

"Right," I say. The number of times I've heard _that_ before. "Make my day."

"I never joined the Death Eaters. Not because I hated what they stood for, not because I was rebelling against my father, but because I wanted to keep my options open. As long as you were alive I knew there was a chance that the Dark Lord would be defeated."

"So if the Order had been defeated, you'd have joined Lord Voldemort?" I say, in disgust.

"What choice would I have had?" Nott protests. "I wouldn't have enjoyed serving him, but yes, if it came to it, I would always decide to live rather than die."

"What's the point, though?" I have never understood this way of thinking. "Don't you find that depressing, that there's nothing worth dying for, nothing bigger than you?"

"I suppose," says Nott. "But that wouldn't change it, if it were true."

"It wouldn't have to be!" I exclaim. "My mother gave her life for mine. Not for freedom, not for honour, not glory, not rights for muggles and muggleborns, but for me – just another person."

"I don't know if I could do that." Nott shrugs. "There's no-one I really… besides, if it was just personal loyalties we were fighting for, I'd be on the wrong side, according to you. Aren't you glad I didn't join the Dark Lord, even if it was out of self-interest?"

I almost laugh, he is so characteristically Slytherin.

Nott continues, "I would not have sought out the Dark Lord, but I doubt I would have been able to keep away from him much longer. I had already spent a great deal of energy trying to keep a low profile."

"Actually, you did that quite well – I've seen your Thicknesse-era Ministry file. Not very big. Quite an achievement, really. I would have thought conscription into the Death Eaters almost inevitable for someone with your background."

Nott nods. "It was difficult. Part of my success was down to Draco. He was so eager to join it allowed me to slide past unnoticed, for the most part. I was staying with the Malfoys the summer the wizarding world woke up to the Dark Lord's return. I'd asked permission to stay at home alone when my father was injured at the Ministry but because I wasn't of age I wasn't allowed.

"I've known Draco for a long time, and honestly, he can be a bit much sometimes. He never seems to stop acting as though he has something to prove. At least the Slytherin Quidditch team got seven decent brooms out of his need to show off. I was going to go for Slytherin Seeker, you know."

"Really?" I am surprised; Nott never seemed particularly athletic at school.

"Yes, in second year."

"What model broom did you have?" There is no real reason to digress into Quidditch talk, but it is actually something I have done before with suspects; I can tell you now that Antonin Dolohov's views on Beaters are only slightly less outrageous than his concept of Muggle relations. I generally use this kind of small talk as a way to build some kind of rapport with suspects, and while some people might consider it a pointless waste of time, I think it does help in the evidence-gathering process.

"A Silver Arrow," Nott says, with something like pride in his voice. "It was my mother's, still in perfect condition."

"It's a classic broom."

"Yeah, I loved it more than anything. You could just get on it and escape everything, you know?"

"I _do_ know, in fact, I'll never forget the first time I rode a broomstick. So you were a good flier?"

"Yeah, I'm rusty now, of course, haven't flown in years, but at the time I was all right. But Malfoy got wind of the fact I was going to try out – I don't know how, I didn't tell anyone. The Slytherin team got those new brooms, and that was that, he was their Seeker. I suppose my father could have afforded a similar gift, but he wouldn't have thought to make it, and I wouldn't have asked.

"Not many people know this, but Malfoy's family haven't always been rich. In fact, he's only a couple of generations away from being Weasley poor. Don't look at me like that, it's true. That's why he flaunts his family's money so much. The house – Malfoy Manor I mean – was only built by his great grandfather. They made their money through trade, a salt mine in India. The Malfoys wrested it from two wizarding families who had been fighting over it for millenia. Turns out, the mine is the only source for a compound that is still used in most cough potions. Not very glamorous, I suppose, but that's where their money comes from. Still, Malfoy's blood as pure as anyone's and the name has always been there. Guess you don't care about that, though."

"Is it important to you?" I say, evenly.

"Oh, I don't know," says Nott, distractedly. "It does mean something, doesn't it?"

"If you're bigoted."

Nott sits up a bit, glaring at me. "Calling me bigoted proves nothing, Potter, least of all that I'm wrong. If people think it means something, then it means something. You said yourself that there are things bigger and more important than one's own life, and for many people I know, blood purity is one of them."

He has a point. The war we fought only serves to underscore the fact that, to them, this lunacy is real.

"But back to Malfoy," Nott continues, doggedly. "That was the summer he became a Death Eater. The thing about Malfoy is, he's so transparent."

He catches my raised eyebrow.

"You don't think so? Well, I've known him a lot longer than you have, and obviously he's different with other Slytherins. He's a good Occlumens – we both are, even me, even now – but I've known him too long. He was plainly terrified of what the Dark Lord had called him to do, but in order to forget about that he kept trying to make me feel jealous of the fact that the Dark Lord had chosen _him_ and not me. And I just wanted to laugh, because that was the last thing I cared about. By then I already knew I didn't want any part in this war. It wasn't clear which way things would go at that point, so I was determined not to take sides. If I committed myself to the Dark Lord, I would have to fight for him and possibly die for him, neither of which I had the remotest desire to do. But I hardly wanted to declare myself his enemy either."

"Voldemort would have been defeated much more easily if more people had been brave enough to fight him," I say.

"It wasn't cowardice that kept me away, it was lack of conviction," Nott counters. "Can't you understand that?"

_A/N: More feedback would be very much appreciated. Too navelgaze-y? Close enough in character? Needs more nudity? Constructive criticism always welcome, as is outrageously lavish praise :)_


	4. Gregory

I thought Malfoy was going to explode when that article came out. It was weird the way it happened. We went down for breakfast one day, and as we walked into the Great Hall, a strange hush fell. I could sense people looking at us, but when looked around to I try to catch someone staring at me they all averted their eyes. Now I'm used to that part, because anyone catching my eye is just asking for a fight and I could take out just about anyone at Hogwarts, even Vince if it came to it, I reckon, but me and him are like brothers so I can't really see that happening. I knew something was up, though, and what was really bugging me was that I could tell they were all looking at me, Vince and Malfoy as we all walked to Charms but I didn't know why or how to get them to stop.

Then at break Pansy, mad as hell, came into the common room with a magazine and thrust it under Draco's nose.

"The Quibbler? What would I want with that godawful rag?" he snapped.

"Look." She jabbed at the headline splashed across the cover, "HARRY POTTER SPEAKS OUT AT LAST: THE TRUTH ABOUT HE WHO MUST NOT BE NAMED AND THE NIGHT I SAW HIM RETURN".

"Yes, I see it. I just don't understand why I have to keep up with Potter's press cuttings."

"Read the article. You're not going to like it."

Malfoy grabbed it from her and began to read, his eyes darting quickly across the page. Suddenly he breathed out, loudly.

"No… this is too much…" he muttered. He held the magazine out to me, pointing to the section he wanted me to look at. I read:

"'…at that point he sent out a summons to his Death Eaters by means of a secret tattoo they each have on their forearms, which depicts the Dark Mark. They formed a circle and he walked around it, chastising each one for their lack of loyalty, sometimes even using the Cruciatus Curse. I was tied to a gravestone watching all this; none of them thought I would leave the scene alive so they did not trouble to keep their identities secret.' Harry Potter looks around us, taking in the busy pub scene that seems so at odds with this darkest of tales. He leans close to me, as if afraid that the valuable information he is about to impart will be overheard. 'Rita,' he whispers, 'They thought they would kill me. But I survived, and now I need you to tell the world what I know. The Death Eaters present were: Malfoy, Crabbe, Goyle, Avery, Macnair, Nott…'"

"Outrageous, isn't it?" said Malfoy, snatching the magazine away from me before I'd finished. "Nott should read this."

We found Nott in the library, where he was poring over several thick leather-bound books, scribbling notes on a scruffy piece of parchment.

"Have you seen this?" demanded Malfoy, shoving the magazine under his nose. Nott looked up at us, bewildered, as though he had been awakened from a trance. He read the article in what seemed like five seconds flat, then thought for a few moments.

"I don't think there's much we can really do about it," he said, finally.

"Not much we can do?" said Malfoy incredulously. "This is slander! Potter's gone too far this time. I think I'll…"

"There's nothing you can do," said Nott, more firmly. "Fudge doesn't believe that our fathers are Death Eaters, and that's what matters. If Harry Potter wants dispute that in a fine publication like the Quibbler, let him, as it only shows how desperate he is. Just don't let him know you're rattled, or people will start thinking there's some truth to these rumours."

"But Potter can't just get away with saying all this stuff!"

"Do you think Umbridge will let him?" Nott countered, evenly.

"She has!" Malfoy shouted. Madam Pince turned around and hissed at him.

"He's got a nasty scar on his wrist – have you noticed that? I'll bet you anything he'll have more detentions coming his way after this." Nott seemed quietly confident.

"Well, she's not doing anything about the filth that Potter's circulating!" Malfoy kept his voice to an angry whisper.

"You used to spread similar rumours about your family's Dark connections yourself to stop the first years from sitting in your favourite chair in the common room. What difference does it make?"

"So Potter's trying to dirty the Malfoy name, and you think that's fine?"

"You think an association with the Dark Lord is 'dirtying'?" Nott challenged, a strange look in his eyes.

"I – I didn't say that," Malfoy faltered.

"No," said Nott, whose attention seemed to have drifted back to the volume he had been studying. "I wouldn't worry about it. Potter's not exactly the most credible source, and you can bet Umbridge is going to get her revenge because they've made her look so stupid."

"I hope so," said Malfoy forcefully.

"Oh look, they've come to gloat," said Vince. We all turned around to see Potter, Granger and Weasley's smirking faces.

"Let them," muttered Malfoy. "We'll get even. With Dolores on our side."

I cracked my knuckles, glaring at them. Nott's face was oddly expressionless.

_A/N: Review please? You know you want to..._


	5. Anthony

Wizard chess club meets on Thursday evenings. No clashes with DA meetings so far, which was fortunate because Terry, Michael and I were regulars and people would notice if all three of us didn't show up one week. I hadn't mentioned it to Potter though, because I sensed that while Quidditch practice was an inalienable right to students of all houses, wizard chess club came somewhat lower down on his priorities. It still annoys me that the only wizard chess prize ever awarded went to Ron Weasley, who never comes to the club, and even that was made up on the spur of the moment by Albus Dumbledore to prevent Slytherin from winning the House Cup in our first year.

We were a little late that evening because we had been doing a particularly nasty essay for Snape on the theory behind Polyjuice Potion. Everyone was already at a board playing except Nott, who was sitting alone, fiddling with his chessmen, making them march through drills and do sets of press-ups. I began to regret coming. It wasn't he was unpleasant – he was a little standoffish, but he seemed all right, especially considering he was in Slytherin. And he was a decent player too, we were quite evenly matched. But there was a reason that none of the other players were even looking at him from their tables on the other side of the classroom save in little furtive glances, and it was right there in the most recent edition of the _Quibbler_.

People had suspected before, of course. There are names that carry a certain weight in wizards' ears. The wizarding world, after all, is small. Even though I feared for his safety during the war, I am glad my father is a Muggle: our world can be almost claustrophobic at times. It is quite strange when I think that as a wizard, I can do so much that he can't. But I forget the magical powers and abilities he lacks because he is just Dad, and he never had them. He understands our world better than a lot of people who are truly part of it. Maybe he wanted to understand it better because he fell in love with my mum; maybe he just sees parallels with the Muggle world. They were really in love, my parents. Still are, actually. They both gave up their families to be with each other. Mum's parents were disgusted that she'd married beneath her, a pureblood choosing a non-magical man over the bearers of wizarding names with hundreds of years of history. Dad's family said he was betraying his heritage by marrying outside the Orthodox community.

Terry and Michael exchanged swift glances and without delay crossed to a small empty table, leaving me standing by Nott. I glared at them: _Thanks a lot, guys_. But I couldn't have left at this point, it would have been too obvious.

People _say _things about the Slytherins in our year. Slytherin house in general, I think we can agree, has something of a shadow over it, but the rumours surrounding the students in our year were particularly sinister. I don't know how there came to be four Death Eater kids in the year group, and all of them boys, but I doubt it was a coincidence. Most everyone I knew thought that You Know Who had helped all their fathers have sons rather than daughters on the condition that they would become his servants when they grew up. Boys are still generally favoured in the wizarding world, particularly in families like that.

"Alright, Nott?" I said, hoping to keep everything at a cheery, surface level.

"Hello, Goldstein," he said, guardedly.

"Need an opponent?" I asked.

"Might make things more interesting." Nott smirked.

I slid into the chair opposite him.

"Black or white?" I said.

"You know I'm not going to turn down a tactical advantage," he replied, tapping a pawn with his wand to change his chessmen's armour.

"Fine," I said, getting my men out. They weren't too happy; of course, they would have preferred to fight in white.

Nott and I played in silence for quite a while. He had lost one of his rooks before either of us spoke.

Then, darting his eyes around to make sure nobody was listening, he said softly, "I know about the DA."

"Sorry?"

I thought I'd misheard. I didn't want to say anything definite because I wasn't about to give him proof if that was what he was fishing for.

"I said I know about the DA. I know you're in it, and Boot and Corner. Potter's running it, you're all learning defensive magic."

I didn't say anything.

"I'm not going to tell anyone."

"What do you want, Nott?"

"I don't want anything. Knight to E3."

"Then why are you telling me this?"

"I wanted you to know that I know, Goldstein."

"Why would you tell me that, if you weren't trying to blackmail me or something?"

"Because you think that's all I'm capable of," said Nott.

"Isn't it?" I said.

"No."

"I don't trust you."

"I know you don't, but I'm telling you I won't tell anyone, and I won't."

It was like we were playing two chess games, one on the board in front of us and one in our minds, with him and me and Harry and all the rest of the DA as the pieces. Nott's knight took my bishop; rather unusually, the rider had dismounted after knocking my piece over and was proceeding to methodically kick the bishop into submission.

"I've never seen that happen before," said Nott. "Have you?"

The bishop's legs twitched feebly.

"I'm not going to tell anyone, and I want you to remember that," he said. "But there are certain conversations I wouldn't hold in the library, even if I thought it was empty."

"Oh," was all I could say. "Rook to B7."

"I don't think you'll tell Potter that I know."

"What makes you think that?" I snapped.

"You'll risk it. In the end you'll decide it's better to take the chance than to face Potter's certain anger, and the distinct possibility that he'd kick you all out of the DA. You'll reason that someone else might let the details slip, that if there is leak it probably won't get traced to you, and that you can't erase what I know. Yeah, you're probably thinking about doing a memory charm right now, but believe me, I've taken precautions. You'll never find all the memories I've hidden."

"You bastard."

"I'm not using this information for my own gain. Well, not to your detriment anyway. I want you to know you can trust me."

"Great start, Nott."

"You wouldn't do it if you didn't have to. Now you have to. Queen to E2."

"I don't."

"You will, once you've thought it through. And I think that's checkmate, Goldstein." He leaned back in his seat. Furious, I put my chessmen back in their box and left. It was some time before the bishop in that particular set would march gladly into battle for me again.

Terry and Michael had had a close game, and were still arguing over the end result. I couldn't keep my conversation with Nott from them; in truth I felt that they were almost to blame. I made sure we really were in a private corner, and I told them what Nott had said to me.

Mike was to the point. "He's playing with you, bet he loves that sense of power. Pure Slytherin."

"Is that really all he wants?" Terry asked.

"Can't be," said Mike, dismissively.

"There's nothing we can do until he demands something from us," I put in, perhaps slightly defensively.

"Unless we tell Potter," Mike countered.

"How about no?" I said. I'd had some time to think and I was beginning to realize that Nott was right.

"He'd kill us." Terry said grimly.

"I know." I said.

"Beats me how he found out. Nott, I mean," said Terry.

"Yeah, nasty little sneak," said Mike. "He's left us with no choice."

"Well, it's an uneasy truce," I said.

"That's the way things are going, I think," said Terry.

"What do you mean?" asked Mike.

"I know Potter has his ideas about good standing up to evil and obviously I want to see You Know Who defeated as much as the next person, but there are going to be a lot of people who are neutral or ambiguous as to which side they're on," Terry said thoughtfully. "It's a very Gryffindor way of looking at things to want people on one side or the other. Personally, I'd rather Nott stayed neutral than became a Death Eater. Good luck to him, really. He could never become one of us and he knows it."

"You think we can trust him?" I said, starting to feel a little hopeful.

"No, but he's right. What choice do we have?"


	6. Harry & Theodore III

"Until I was of age, I knew I was fairly safe – but I dreaded turning seventeen. It got more difficult, as time went by, but if any of my father's friends pushed me to declare my allegiance to the Dark Lord, I insisted that I needed first to complete my education to be worthy of serving him. The summer before seventh year, when the Ministry fell, I thought it best to leave the country. I toured the wizarding regions of Europe, keeping a low profile, using a false name. I didn't want to take the chance that they'd recruit me. I knew if they came for me it would be almost impossible not to join."

"Why didn't you stay abroad?" I ask. "You could have made yourself Untraceable."

"And abandon any hope of coming back, if Voldemort prevailed?" Nott snaps back.

"Surely a life in exile would have been better than living in Voldemort's Britain? You'd already had a taste of what it could be like. Don't tell me you could get used to that kind of violence."

Nott shifts uncomfortably. "I thought I might have to. I thought that maybe I would grow out of my squeamishness. It was bad, but I didn't know what else to do. Coming back to Hogwarts in the seventh year was like a sick parody of our old school days. You weren't there, you have no idea how awful it was. I would have left, but that was now illegal and the last thing I wanted to do was to draw attention to myself, to get the Snatchers on my case."

"So you fought against the better part of yourself and let evil take hold."

"You would put it like that," says Nott. "I was struggling with my sense of duty, and trying to make the best of things – that's how it seemed to me."

"After Cedric died, Professor Dumbledore made a speech about choosing between what's right and what's easy, do you remember?"

"I do. But I didn't apply it to myself as there didn't really seem to be any easy options."

"Just the path of least resistance," I say.

Nott grimaces. "My father knew what I'd seen had upset me. That in itself was disappointing; emotion has no place where blood and duty are concerned. We are brought up to be self-contained."

"Your father taught you Occlumency?"

"It's more that I was brought up in it. Even when I was a child, emotional outbursts were not tolerated. I was expected to suppress everything, because even if I didn't scream or cry, the pitch of strong emotions would cut right through the atmosphere, and my father would be furious. It was only later that I realized that everything my governess had taught me about keeping myself to myself was pretty much a form of Occlumency. But despite my efforts to conceal my feelings, my father knew that I hadn't made the leap from the theoretical to the practical at all successfully. Although I understood, I thought, the need for wizards to exert their authority, however brutal, over Muggles, I wasn't prepared for the reality of what that would mean..."

He shivers, and continues. "It's not the larger fact of murder that haunts you; it's the details…blood…and sinew. I know what it looks like when skin, muscles and veins are ripped slowly away from living bones. I wish I didn't! I wish I could forget…no, more than that, I want to erase every part of what happened from my mind. You would know better than most the methods one can use to keep thoughts from those who would try to access them, but there's nothing you can do to create such a barrier in your own mind. When you use Occlumency it's almost as though you underscore the memories you wish to keep secret; they stand between you and other people.

"I somehow thought that if someone looked me in the eye, they'd see what had happened that night. For the longest time, I was terrified of being exposed. But then I started being careless… I was still frightened, but I think at some level I just needed to connect with _someone_, however briefly, whatever the consequences. I couldn't keep avoiding people. But then I realized that I could look people in the eyes, hold their gaze so that they really _saw_ me, and know that they still had no idea… that was the worst day of my life, the day I realized that I might forever be alone with what I'd done…"

"But you're here now," I say. "You've done the right thing in telling me."

He doesn't say anything.

"Whatever happens next, you're not alone with it any more. That has to be worth something."

He takes a deep shuddering breath. "I hope so."


	7. Severus

What a night. Black dead, Umbridge severely trampled and me having to go back and forth between London on Dumbledore's orders whilst simultaneously being ready to contact the Dark Lord with aid and assurances at any moment. And the worst part was, it wasn't even over. Now I had to go and wake up three members of my house and tell them that their fathers had been captured in battle.

I groaned. If only proactive Potter had been content to let me go back and check up on Black, instead of gallivanting off, just as the Dark Lord intended, on his ill-starred imaginary rescue mission. We could have avoided all this bother. Although I never cared for Black, I could acknowledge our aims were the same: to protect Harry Potter. And Merlin, did he need protecting. Potter was indeed a law unto himself, hurrying off to get himself killed at every opportunity.

The Slytherin common room was littered with streamers, bottles, butterbeer corks; the remains of a post-exam party. I found Nott, still awake, sitting reading in an alcove in a pair of green striped pajamas with what was left of a plate of tiny cucumber sandwiches by his side. He looked up as I walked past.

"Sir?"

"I need to see you in my office, Nott." I said. "But I also need to fetch Crabbe and Malfoy. Wait here." My stomach growled; it had been a long night and I was hungry. Nott held out the plate to me.

"Sandwich, sir? They're left over from the party."

"It can wait," I said.

In the fifth year dormitory I gently shook Malfoy and Crabbe awake. They were both bleary eyed and somewhat irritable from lack of sleep as could be expected, but I motioned to them to be quiet so as not to wake Zabini and Goyle, and to follow me. They traipsed to my office, where I made a large pot of tea, and poured them each a cup.

"During the night there was a battle between the Death Eaters and the Order of the Phoenix at the Ministry of Magic. I am afraid that your fathers have all been captured, and are likely to be detained for some time."

"Captured?" gasped Malfoy.

"Yes," I nodded grimly.

They sat in shock, Malfoy shuffling his monogrammed slippers, Crabbe inspecting his knuckles, and Nott quietly gripping his tea.

"Potter was there, as you may have guessed, along with the other students who evaded the Inquisitorial Squad. It seems that Professor Umbridge was attacked by centaurs in the Forest. She survived, although I scarcely need say that she was seriously hurt and is now in the hospital wing. Dumbledore has returned."

"Dumbledore?" Malfoy spat. "He's a wanted fugitive!"

"Not any more," I said, swiftly. "The Ministry has…ah, revised its position on Dumbledore."

"It's all out now. Fudge himself saw the Dark Lord disapparate from the Ministry, and they cannot ignore the fact of his return any longer."

I paused for a moment to let this sink in, and then continued.

"However, the three of you are now my chief concern. It is likely that the names of those captured at the Ministry will be published. We must hope that the magical community will understand that you had nothing to do with your fathers' actions, but I'm afraid I must warn you that you are likely to experience at least some backlash."

"I can take care of myself!" Malfoy declared, jutting out his chin.

"I am sure you can," I replied. "But you must be aware of the potential costs of defending family honour. By all means manage your reputations, but I would advise you to avoid conflict and confrontations as far as possible. Nobody knows what will happen in the coming years."

"The Dark Lord will rise and rule. Don't you believe that, sir?"

"Naturally that is my dearest wish and my fervent belief. But many things could happen between now and that glorious day and you would be wise to keep a low profile until then."

The three boys got to their feet, exchanging swift, sidelong glances: nervous, but unwilling to be the first to appear so.

"One moment, Nott." I waited until the other two had left the room. "I have something further to tell you. You might want to sit down again."

"Sir?"

"Your father was injured in battle. I do not know how serious the wounds he sustained are, but he has been sent to St. Mungo's rather than Azkaban. He is still in Ministry custody, of course."

"Injured?"

"I'm afraid so."

"How?"

"We think it likely that he was trapped by falling debris. Ordinarily a wizard would not usually sustain significant injuries from this type of…accident, but your father… is not as young as he was. Reactions not what they used to be."

"Will I be allowed to see him?"

"Relatives of prisoners in Azkaban are not usually allowed even deathbed visits, but you may be able to get special dispensation. I cannot say."

"Deathbed?"

"It's not at that stage yet, I assure you. And he may still recover."

"But where will I stay over the summer? Will I be able to go home?"

"Ah. Dumbledore wishes to see you about your arrangements for the holidays."

"I want to stay at home. I'm perfectly capable of looking after myself."

"I'm sure you are, but I suspect that Dumbledore will have other ideas. We wouldn't normally allow an underage wizard to live alone, and in the current circumstances I would think it even less likely."

"You will at least ask him for me, sir, won't you?"

I sighed. "Go to his office at ten this morning, you can discuss it then. But do try to get some sleep first."


	8. Albus

I had spent most of the morning fixing my silver Discumbobulators, which Harry, bless him, had smashed in his fury. It was good to have to do, to take my mind off the things I didn't want to think about. I had individually mended each broken part and reassembled them, and was just trying to get my second-favourite Discumbobulator running again when there was a knock at my door. It had been a morning of interruptions; I was fairly sure this was the hundredth person to knock at my door today.

"Come in!" I called. A tall, skinny boy in Slytherin robes shuffled in. As headmaster, I have to try to be even-handed about these things, but I do have difficulty with the Slytherins. In a way, they remind me of how I thought and felt during my youth, my arrogance that destroyed my family. Only Aberforth remembers now, and he will never forgive me. Nor should he.

"Ah, Theodore, hello!"

The Nott boy looked anxious and his eyes had a red sheen of tiredness. I had wondered about Theodore. According to his teachers he was a bright pupil, studious and quiet. Most of the other members of staff had recommended him as Slytherin prefect, but I had thought it best to keep him away from even this minor position of power. There was something so cold and closed about him. Draco Malfoy was spoiled, impetuous and prejudiced, but I found him easy to read, despite all his efforts to the contrary. But Nott…I just couldn't tell, and it scared me. He could have been progressive, as far as Slytherins are, or he could have been another Tom Riddle. There was no way of knowing.

Of course, I couldn't really blame the Nott boy for his secrecy, as he would have seen nothing to gain by confiding in me. I wondered which, if any, of his housemates knew his true allegiances. If he had no loyalty to Voldemort he would be best off keeping that quiet; even if he did believe in Riddle's cause he might want to keep his options open. These children of Death Eaters tread a difficult path, particularly the sons. How can we keep them away from Voldemort when both their parents and their contemporaries push them towards him? It was better, I thought, to keep children like Theodore as far as possible from the influence of others in the hope that they develop their own sense of purpose and morality.

"Good morning, Professor Dumbledore,"

"Do have a seat, Theodore," I indicated a chair.

"Thank you, sir," he said, slinking into it.

"As you know, we will need to discuss your arrangements for the summer holidays."

"Did Professor Snape pass on my request?" Theodore looked up at me anxiously, then quickly away.

"He did," I said, surveying him over my spectacles. "But I'm afraid that you will not be allowed to stay at your home alone."

He looked disappointed but not surprised.

"The Ministry will probably send someone to search the property for Dark objects." I tried to keep my voice casual, light, as though this were an everyday occurrence.

The Nott boy flinched; despite my tone, I could see that to him the words were still weighted with disgrace.

"If the Ministry are searching my house, I want to be there!" He stopped, as if shocked by his own lack of poise.

"You will be allowed to be present while representatives of the Ministry are there," I explained soothingly. "But you are not permitted to be there alone."

Theodore glared. "It's my house."

"I'm sorry."

Quickly, he tried another tack: "Thickthorn Chase is not the only house in my family's possession. I could stay at Twelve Oaks. Unless the Ministry want to search that too?"

"They may do. But I'm afraid that the central problem is that you are not legally of age. Someone needs to be your acting guardian for the summer. Narcissa Malfoy sent an owl to let me know that you could stay with her and Draco."

"Can't I stay here, at Hogwarts?"

"Would you rather stay here?"

"Obviously."

I was reminded of another conversation, between another headmaster and another Slytherin. Tom Riddle had scarcely wanted to leave Hogwarts…

"Why?" I asked, not really expecting an answer.

He shrugged, indifferently.

_Cold,_ I thought. _They're raised to be so cold._

Then he spoke. "I know some of the teachers stay over the summer, so I wouldn't be alone. They'd probably barely notice me…" His tone was pleading, deperate.

"Do you not want to stay with the Malfoys?" I said, curiously. I knew the ties between the two families went back further even than the time of Voldemort's first rise to power, but I knew nothing of the relationship between the two boys. They simply did not interest me. True, I did not want either of them to join Voldemort, but in general I viewed such people as the spoiled sons of wizarding privilege: bored, arrogant and utterly banal.

"I am grateful to them for their concern about me, sir," said Theodore tonelessly.

There was a rather pregnant pause. I did not know which would be more dangerous: leaving Theodore Nott alone in his family's house for the summer where he'd be easily found by Death Eaters looking to fill their ranks, or sending him to stay with another Dark family. It's more than likely he'll end up with a Dark Mark on his arm - but I'd be a fool to give him the run of Hogwarts for the summer.

"I am afraid, Theodore, that I cannot permit you to remain at Hogwarts for the summer holidays." I said. "As you know, students may stay over the summer only in very exceptional circumstances. While I agree that your situation would qualify, my first duty is to ensure the castle's security. We cannot have students here while we perform the necessary magical fortifications. I'm sorry."

"There's nowhere else I can go?"

"I am sure you would not wish to snub Narcissa Malfoy by ignoring her offer and lodging at a bed and breakfast."

"And I really can't go home?"

"It's out of the question, I'm afraid."

The Nott boy was silent. I let him sit for a moment, thinking, and then said gently, "I'll send Mrs. Malfoy an owl. She will be glad to have you to stay."

"All right," said Theodore flatly. He started to rise from his chair.

"One more thing," I said. "Could you possibly tell me the story of the wizard and the hopping pot?"

He stared, nonplussed. I suppose it was rather an odd question.

"I'm doing some research on the tales of Beedle the Bard," I smiled.

"Oh…I'm afraid I've never read them in the original runes," said Theodore. "I know I should have…"

"I was actually hoping that you'd say that. My interest, you see, is in the tale as it has been passed down through generations of wizards. So just tell me the story as you remember it."

"All right…" said Theodore suspiciously. "Well, there's an old wizard at the beginning who dies…and he leaves his son his cauldron. The other people in the village know the family is magical, and one day the son hears a knock at his door and answers it to see a muggle woman. She's covered in warts and she's angry because she thinks the wizard hexed her."

As I thought. This was sad in its predictability.

"She keeps trying to hit him with her rolling pin, and he can only dodge out of its way because he came to the door unprepared to defend himself. But then, his father's cauldron, which has suddenly sprouted a foot, leaps up and swallows her whole. Apart from the occasional noises she makes banging around inside the pot, the wizard is left in peace until later that evening. Then a man comes with a pitchfork, furious because he thinks that the wizard Vanished his donkey. But before he can stab the wizard, the pot leaps up and swallows him whole. Then…these things usually come in threes, don't they… an outraged mother with a flaming torch, convinced that the wizard has cursed her baby. And the pot leaps up and swallows her whole. Eventually the rest of the muggle villagers decide that they don't want to be eaten by the pot, and they go together to the wizard's house, where they solemnly promise to leave him alone. And then the pot regurgitates all the muggles it has swallowed. "

He stopped and looked up at me, still not quite believing that I really wanted to hear him repeat a children's story.

"Thank you, Theodore." I said heavily. He was still looking at me strangely.

The way to approach Slytherins, especially smart, cynical ones like Theodore Nott, is subtlety. Tell them they need to renounce Voldemort, or even that they have your support if they turn their backs on the Dark side before they're good and ready and you've lost them for sure. But plant an idea in their minds, be patient and persistent and hopefully, eventually, they'll come to you. That was the plan, of course. Truthfully I hadn't had too much luck with Slytherins in the past. I'd had to lose Severus before he came back to me, and even then that was more to do with Lily Potter than anything I had ever done.

"Here…" I took a handsome new gold and white paperback book out of the drawer of my desk and slid it across to him.

"What's that, sir?"

"You've studied Ancient Runes, haven't you, Theodore?"

"Yes, sir. But I'm thinking about dropping it next year."

"That would be a very great shame. Do try to keep it up if you can. Perhaps this will inspire you. It's the original runic version of _The Tales of Beedle Bard_. You should have no problems reading it with an OWL in Ancient Runes."

"Oh…thank you, sir. When would you like it back?"

"You may keep it, Theodore."

"That's very kind of you, sir." Again, he sounded almost suspicious. He picked up the book, running a finger down the embossed spine. "Why is the cover so strange and thin?"

"It's a paperback," I explained. "They're more affordable than any other kind of binding, and lighter to carry around. Far more common in Muggle bookshops, of course," I couldn't resist adding, "but I think they're starting to catch on in our world. Ours are reinforced with spells to give them a bit more durability. It's interesting how Muggle technology has influenced our world."

"Yes, I suppose," said Theodore politely, whilst still managing to convey a veiled sense of skepticism.

"You don't think so?" I said. "Isn't the Hogwarts Express a steam engine? Where do you think the idea for the Wizarding Wireless Network came from?"

"Ottaline Gambol," Theodore muttered, under his breath. "Now there's a name you don't bring up in polite company."

I continued, mildly, "I think it is a mistake we make too often, to assume that wizards and Muggles inhabit discrete and distinct worlds. The reality is, as ever, more complicated. Beedle knew that, and I hope you will remember it too. Now if you will excuse me, I have a busy day ahead of me. If you encounter difficulties in your arrangements over the summer, please do not hesitate to contact Professor Snape."

I hoped he would read it. I hoped I hadn't needled him too much and ruined everything. I hoped that seeing how this simple story had been changed to serve a darker purpose he would learn to question the truth of what his father and his peers must have told him about blood purity. Planting seeds. That's all I can do.

_A/N: I hope you like :) Thought I'd say here that the inconsistent capitalization of "Muggle" was actually a stylistic choice - Dumbledore is using the word in a much more respectful way. I suppose I could have worked that into the story somehow, but meh. _


	9. Harry & Theodore IV

"Dumbledore's death shocked us all. Yes, even the Slytherins. We knew it was the end of an era. The end of childhood. Malfoy had been useful to the Dark Lord, so we knew he would soon come for the rest of us. No Dumbledore standing in the way now. I suppose most people thought we were hungry for war, but the last thing most of us wanted was to destroy the only world we knew. Well, maybe some people did, but it was only idiots like Parkinson whose poverty of mind would give them only the cheapest, basest concept of victory. Spoiled children incapable of picturing the realities of the Dark Lord's future reign. And I'm referring to their parents in this too. Their entire perception was so… infantile, I can scarcely believe how easy it was for him to manipulate them.

"Even if I hadn't seen what I saw, I doubt I would have been as desperate to be a Death Eater as Malfoy or Crabbe. You see, my mother was a Wilkes. Persephone Wilkes, that was her maiden name. Her brother was killed in the first war too. Haemon Wilkes. You've heard of him? Well, I suppose you're an expert in this…field. Haemon was the last to bear the Wilkes name, and he died in the first war. So I knew that entire bloodlines, entire histories, could be erased with a single, well-placed curse. That that was normal in battle. But it was also what we were fighting for."

"To kill yourselves?" I say, sarcastically. I'm amazed he's telling me this, even after all I know about him. I'm not exactly going to have much sympathy for the Death Eater cause and at this point he will be lucky to escape a custodial sentence.

"No," says Nott, choosing to take what I've said at face value. "We want to preserve our families and to keep our identities."

"'Our identities?' You count yourself among them?"

"I did," Nott replies. "And in a way, I still do. But after I saw death, I realized I didn't believe in any idea devoutly enough to die for it."

"So you avoided joining any side."

"Yes, and I don't know that that was such a terrible thing."

"You knew what you'd done was wrong. You must have known that there would only be more of these killings. Why didn't you want to fight Voldemort? Would you really have been able to live under his rule?"

"I've already told you why I didn't resist him. And you're not the only one who thinks that a person should care enough about something to be willing to give their life for it. As it is, most of the people I grew up with think I lack the proper pride in my wizarding heritage. It was a difficult line to tread, to appear keen for the Dark Lord to take over but to play absolutely no part in helping it come about. After Dumbledore died, I felt much more vulnerable.

"I still remember the last time I spoke to Dumbledore, it was at Christmas dinner when I was in the sixth year. Most people went home, but I didn't have anywhere to go. The year before I hadn't come home for Christmas because I was angry with my father about…well, you know, and frightened of what else he might show me, in the hopes of further extending my education. He knew that I had been horrified by what had happened in the summer, and I knew that disappointed him. I was not the son he wanted; I would never be able to take his place as the Dark Lord's servant. I didn't know that a year later his broken body would be stretched out on a hospital bed in St. Mungo's. I still feel a bit guilty sometimes, when I think that I deliberately stayed away for what would have been the last family Christmas. Yes, I know what you think of my father, Potter, but this is what you have to understand about families like mine. I may detest what he has done, what he made me do, but I know why he did it and he is still my father and the only family I've ever had. So I feel dreadful even now, that I stayed away, even though I used the excuse of my OWLs to spare his feelings.

"So it was my second Christmas at Hogwarts in a row. There weren't too many of us there. Times were getting darker and more difficult and most people wanted to be at home with their families. I was petrified, because Dumbledore had a reputation as a powerful Leglimens, and I had a lot to hide. I thought I'd got away with it that time he called me to his study, but of course I didn't know for sure.

"But Dumbledore just smiled at me and said, 'How did you like Beedle?' I think I said something along the lines of, 'It was very interesting.' Well, that was an understatement. The original tale of the Wizard and the Hopping Pot had been nothing short of a shock to me. I couldn't believe that the version I knew was so different to the runic text; in fact, I suspected that Dumbledore had given me an altered new version authorized by some wishy-washy Mudblood-loving… sorry… I didn't mean to use that word…I don't…I…I've offended you now, haven't I? I really didn't mean it… and that makes it worse doesn't it?"

He looked wretched. I had done very little talking since he had burst in. He was skittish but bleary-eyed and talking himself hoarse.

"I was wrong, anyway. After looking at other copies in the library, Flourish and Blotts and even King Ludd's, you know, the secondhand bookshop in Knockturn Alley, I was forced to admit that the story I had been told was not the one that Beedle had written. Which of course was what Dumbledore had meant me to discover. I wondered, guiltily, whether he had guessed what I would do when confronted with the truth.

"'It's always difficult when we discover that what our parents have told us is wrong and our most cherished beliefs fall about us like a house of cards,' he said. Patronizing git, I thought. Really? A house of cards? Such eloquence, sir! Have you any more pearls of wisdom you would like to offer me? Because you know what it's like to be the son of a Death Eater. You know exactly what it's like to have your father to force you to torture and to kill, do you, and to be made to feel like a failure when you can't do it!

Nott paused, as if startled by his own strength of feeling. He continued, "But I was sorry he died. I think he wanted to help people like me, he just didn't know how."


	10. Arthur

"Suspected" Death Eaters, that was what we had to call them, officially, even though we'd all seen them trying to kill off Order members when we arrived at the Ministry, had even witnessed You Know Who's brief appearance when what should have been a simple collection job turned into the Death Eaters' biggest disaster since their master's quiet return. The son of the suspected Death Eater Aldous Nott had requested a visit home to pick up some things. He'd wanted to stay there, alone, but we just couldn't allow it, times being what they were.

"You'd be the best one to handle this, Weasley," said Quentin Whitmore, who had taken over the Dark Objects Division at the Ministry at the same time I'd been given Office for the Detection and Confiscation of Counterfeit Defensive Spells and Protective Objects. "You've got a son about his age. Haven't you?"

"As a matter of fact, yes," I said. "He's sixteen, you say? Same year as Ron, then."

"Shouldn't be too much of a problem, he's just a kid really," Whitmore continued. "But he's bound to be upset about his father's arrest. I want someone who's got experience with teenagers on this one, just in case. The boy knows he's allowed to watch the inspection but he didn't seem too bothered about that, I think he just wants to pick up a few things."

"Sure," I said, taking the case notes he held out to me and heading for the door.

Whitmore called after me, "Just make sure he doesn't remove anything we can use as evidence against the father."

And so on the first day of the Hogwarts summer holidays I found myself apparating up to Oxfordshire, and walking to the Nott residence, Thickthorn Chase. The Nott boy met me in front of the imposing wrought iron gates. It was impossible to see him there and not recognize the startling contrast he made with Ron. He was about my own height, still skinny like a boy, but he held himself like a man. While Ron wears Muggle clothes during the holidays, this boy was wearing a sombre set of wizard's robes, slightly worn, although the fabric was very fine and they had clearly been expensive when new.

"Hello, Mr.– " He checked the letter he was holding, whether to signify my lack of importance to him, or an innocent confirmation of my name I wasn't sure, "–Weasley."

"And you are Theodore Nott?"

"Correct."

I've noticed that formality in the proud pure-blood families before, especially the ones tending to the Dark side, the way the sons act in precisely the same manner as their fathers. Still, I tried to picture Ron in his situation, and just couldn't imagine it. When I was injured at the Ministry, Molly and the children pulled together to support me and one another, and that's how we made it through. Ron's certainly been in some terrifying situations with Harry, but I just couldn't picture him so alone in the world and dealing with adults in this stiff, formal way.

"Shall we get started then?" I asked.

The Nott boy fished a set of heavy silver keys out of his robes. He unlocked the gate, which swung noisily open. We walked through and it shut behind us with a macabre squeal. The path up to the house was long and straight, lined on each side with rows of lime trees. It led up to an arch, and suddenly we were in a walled garden. The gardens were stunning. It was summer, so they were at the very height of colour: magenta, orange, yellow, electric blue, purple, crimson. They were walled, in the medieval style, each flowered chamber passing into one yet more sequestered and exquisite. The boy said nothing to me as we walked through the gardens. We passed through walls lined with honeysuckle and wisteria, fairies chattering among the flowers, before arriving suddenly upon the house.

The building was sprawling, ornate and charming, crumbling but still magnificent. Though fashioned from the same golden stone, it had clearly been extended by generations of Notts in the style of the day, so that the house was a jumble of different features: cupolas, balconies, flying buttresses, even a Bridge of Sighs stretching over an artificial lake. We walked up a grand set of steps to a high, imposing double door. The boy pulled out another key which flew up to the lock and fitted itself snugly inside, turning around as if getting comfortable. He tapped the winged horse to the right of the door with his wand; it sprang to attention and he spoke to it.

"It's me," he said. "Theodore."

Both horses drew themselves up, fluttered from their podiums and each opened the doors in a single movement, then sank to their knees, bowing for us to pass. The foyer was light and airy, still grand but slightly more rustic than I might have imagined: flagstones, austere white walls, dark wood paneling.

There was a sudden of peal of squealing and a flurry of tiny limbs.

"Master Theodore!" A house elf sped past me, hurling herself towards the boy and hugging his legs. He patted her head awkwardly.

"Master Theodore, your father is going away and he isn't coming back home. I is worrying, I isn't knowing where he go." She sobbed.

"Erm…Dappy…I…" The Nott boy looked around wildly. The elf had disconcerted him and for the first time I thought I glimpsed the frightened teenage boy behind his formal façade. He clearly didn't know what to tell her. I cleared my throat and knelt down so that our eyes were level. She had to find out sooner or later.

"Dappy…I'm afraid that Aldous Nott…your master…has been taken into custody. He was caught trespassing at the Ministry of Magic with You Know Who and some other Death Eaters."

The elf looked at me, her blue orb-like eyes wide. She blinked. Then she hurled herself onto the floor of the entrance hall, sobbing wildly. The Nott boy gave me dirty look. I felt a rather disproportionate surge of annoyance.

"Mister Aldous, Mister Aldous!" wailed the elf. "What will he do without Dappy to look after him?"

It occurred to me that while we considered the house to be standing empty, no one had taken into consideration the presence of the house elf. While unaware of her master's capture, she would have been unlikely to have hidden or destroyed any Dark objects, but there was nothing to stop her doing so as soon as I left. Something would have to be done.

The Nott boy led me through to the drawing room, leaving the elf weeping on the flagstones. ("Don't worry, she'll cry herself out.") It was a generously proportioned room lined with bookshelves. The carpet was a rich red and two enormous tan chesterfields half-filled the room. There were strange curios, everywhere: a silver candelabra in the shape of an octopus, a tiny trebuchet, clay oil lamps, a model square-rigger, lumps of glass with tiny figures rattling around inside. A portrait of a plain witch hung over the fireplace. She beamed at us as we entered.

"Hello, Mummy," called the Nott boy.

"Hello, my dear," she said. "Back for the holidays?"

"Not exactly," the boy replied.

"Boys will be boys," she said, indulgently. "I expect you're off on a jaunt with your friends."

"Something like that," he said.

"You look taller every time I see you," she gazed at him fondly.

"You don't see me," he said curtly. "Not really. You're just a portrait."

She looked rather hurt, but forced a smile.

"And who is this?" she said, as if noticing me for the first time.

"From the Ministry, Mummy. Arnold Weasley."

"The Ministry? Whatever are they doing here?" she asked, an edge to her voice now.

It was then I recognized her, her buggy, wide-set eyes, small thin-lipped mouth, delicate upturned nose at odds with her square, masculine jaw: Persephone Wilkes Nott, casualty of the first war and reproach to the Aurors and Barty Crouch's draconian methods of law enforcement. Although there had been an inquiry, the Wizangamot had ruled no wrongdoing, a fact that had infuriated many, and not just those on the side of the Death Eaters. The son had been a mere baby at the time of the incident, not even a year old. I was fairly certain that he could have no memory of the killing, but he would have heard about it all his life.

"They're searching the place," her son said.

"I hope you'll be polite, darling," said the witch in the portrait.

"I'll try, Mummy," replied the Nott boy.

A flash in the corner caught my eye, the sun reflecting off a delicate mobile of hanging scrolls, stars, ribbons and golden thread, lightly twisting in the slight wind. The Nott boy caught me looking at it.

"Goes back to Bertilak," He said, a note of pride in his voice. "You know, Merlin's contemporary. Not _quite _as brilliant, but still."

"What is it?" I asked, still confused.

"It's our family tree," he said impatiently. "The scrolls are our birth certificates from St. Mungo's. That's me." He pointed to a scroll tied with a purple satin ribbon dangling precariously under the cloud; it looked rather isolated down there. "I expect your family just keep a book of names or something like that."

I didn't say anything; I wasn't sure. Muriel was much more bothered about this kind of thing, so she might have some of this information written down, but I'd never bothered keeping track. The idea was abhorrent to me, actually. It doesn't make a difference to me, and it shouldn't to anyone. Except not really knowing any Muggles does make it hard to get all the artifacts I'd like.

The boy raised an eyebrow. "You don't keep any record? None at all?" He seemed incredulous.

"No," I said, shortly. "Now, have you decided whether you will be attending the entire search?"

"I don't think so," he said. "I may drop in now and then to see how the search is going, though."

"You do know you will have to pre-arrange these visits?"

"What?" He was shocked.

"Wasn't that explained to you?" I asked.

"No," said the boy bitterly. "It wasn't. You mean I can't even visit my own house when I want to?"

"We will, of course, make every effort to accommodate your wishes," I said quickly.

He didn't say anything. He crossed to the chesterfield by the oriel window and sat for a moment, breathing hard.

"Are you all right?" I asked.

"Leave me alone," he snapped. "I know what you think of me."

I was silent for a while. I looked out of the mullioned windows into the garden below. It was a beautiful day, still early enough that the dew in the shadow of the walled gardens had not yet dried. The boy leaned his head back on the sofa and took a deep breath.

"Let's go," he said, standing up. "Most of the stuff I want is in my room."

We went up to the top floor. I was somehow expecting it to be a neat reflection of what had appeared to me a prematurely middle-aged character but it was as untidy as any of my son's rooms; inside it looked as though a herd of books had multiplied and taken over. There were stacks of them everywhere covering most of the floor, some of them placed face down amid the forest of empty tea-stained mugs. An adjoining door led to a messy washroom full of crumpled towels, and beyond that were the governess's quarters. I imagined that this had been the nursery for generations of Nott children. In spite of myself I wondered whether this was where it had happened, the room in which Persephone Wilkes Nott had died, struck by a stray curse, her lifeless form crumpled over the cot in which her infant son lay. The thought was horrible. An old rocking horse stood in the corner, covered in robes, its silhouette monstrously exaggerated by the folds of fabric.

My job was to inspect everything he wanted to remove, giving everything a good jab with a Secrecy Sensor, and then make a note of each item to be kept on file. A precautionary measure, if you like. The Ministry would then search the house, which the boy had the right to observe if he wished to do so, provided he gave us twenty-four hours advance notice. Then there was also the Wilkes estate, which had fallen to the boy following the death of his mother and uncle, and was under the father's care until he came of age. We had locked the property down, but that too would need to be searched.

"Right, let's get started," I said.

The first thing was to inspect the trunk he wanted to take so that he would have something in which to put all of his things. It was a beautiful varnished oak chest with the name _Theodore St. John Nott_ stamped on it in gold: "my second-best trunk". It was not a terribly big trunk, but he thought he could fit everything in. It was deceptively large, he said.

"All right," he said. "These. I want to take these."

He had brought a precarious pile of books with a strange, hairy lump on top. I gave the books a quick once over and then picked up the hairy thing for a closer inspection. It was a shrunken head.

"I can't let you take that, I'm afraid."

"Why not?"

"You have documentation for it, I hope?"

"Of course," he said, passing over a piece of paper with the Ministry seal on it. I looked it over: _Name of importer of restricted artifact: Telemachus Cripp-Rivers Nott. Country of extraction: Peru. Date of importation: 22__nd__ November 1793. Name of deceased: unknown. _The document appeared genuine, and the date made the head untouchable, although the law on human artifacts had been tightened considerably since then. The Nott boy gave me a smug look and, dropping the books in the trunk, made as if to take the shrunken head.

"You can't remove it from this house, I'm afraid," I said brightly.

He frowned. "Why not?"

"Shrunken heads are classified as a type 5D restricted item, an artifact that may have the power to conceal Dark magic within it. A simple Secrecy Sensor or Sneakoscope wouldn't pick that up. This classification also includes brooms, wands and certain types of magical garment."

"So if I wanted to collect a _broom_ I wouldn't be allowed?" he said incredulously.

"Not right away, we'd have to do some more rigorous tests." I replied.

"How long would that take?" he asked.

"A month, maybe. The head should be quicker, though. Brooms are much more complex."

"Forget the head," said the Nott boy, seizing another pile of books. "I don't need it that badly."

_A/N: Thank you to all my lovely reviewers, especially **shiftingful**, **xXMizz Alec VolturiXx** and **AshleyofRavenclaw** for giving feedback on several chapters. It's really good motivation and your constructive comments are always appreciated. Sorry this particular update took so long but I've had a lot going on IRL as well as getting a weird block about this chapter. Next few will be quicker, I promise! _


	11. Harry & Theodore V

"This probably sounds stupid, but until my father was caught at the Ministry, I hadn't really realized how well known my family were. How hated we were. When I came back in the sixth year, everyone seemed to know who I was. They'd heard from their families about my father's first trial, and some of them even knew about my great-grandfather's… experiments on muggles. He was considered a learned scholar once, you know. What he did might have been controversial, even at the time, but it certainly wasn't illegal. Now, however… In Slytherin quarters it was all right, but as soon as I ventured outside I was open to catcalls and questions about Daddy. We were on the wrong side, but people weren't afraid of us. They couldn't reach the Dark Lord or the Death Eaters, but they could hex us and jinx us and trip us in the corridors. They felt powerless in the face of his return, but that was one thing they could do. Of course, in seventh year Malfoy, Crabbe and Goyle would make them pay for the indignities they suffered, but they didn't know that then. Although everyone was afraid that year, it no longer worked as a source of power for us. The imprisonment of our fathers was humiliating."

"It must have been hard for you," I say, sarcastically.

"It was!" Nott looks annoyed.

"Come on. It's not like you were a muggleborn student, terrified of being picked off or having your whole family killed. Your pure blood and your father's standing in Voldemort's inner circle protected you," I say.

"From some things," he says. "But it wasn't a cakewalk, you know."

"It was still easier for you than it was for the muggleborns. You can't imagine what it was like for them," I say, thinking of Hermione's tears as she told us about hiding her parents.

"I can," he says. "But it's not like it was. There are fewer options for someone like me now."

I laugh hollowly. "How can you deny that you have a lot more options than muggleborns? Yes, even now. You've got connections – you're probably related to half the people in the wizarding world."

"If I achieve anything now it'll be down to that, my privilege and connections," Nott says. "So any success does seem rather hollow."

"I'm surprised that matters to you," I say. "I thought that as a Slytherin the end would justify the means?"

"We're not all the same, you know, and yes, it does matter to me, very much." Nott looks thoughtful. "I like to achieve things for myself. I guess that's what ambition means to me. I'm dreading dying having made barely a ripple in the world, or worse still just floating along in my family's wake. The money and position I've inherited have meant that if I wanted to I wouldn't have to work a day in my life, but in a way that's frustrating. Nothing matters. I might as well be a Squib."

"You're in your twenties," I say. "I don't think you need to worry about your legacy yet."

"Thanks." He smiles bleakly. "You do get the irony that it's you that's telling me this, right?"

"I'm serious," I say. "There's plenty of time for you to make your contribution to magical knowledge or whatever it is you're hoping to do and I seem to remember from school that you're a talented wizard. You got good N.E.W.T.s, didn't you?"

Nott bites his lip. "I think I'd better show you something."

"Look," Nott says. He gets out his wand. I draw mine, covering him; Aurors don't take things on trust. He points his wand at the photograph of Ginny and James on my desk in its silver frame, a heavy, substantial thing.

"_Wingardium leviosa_," he says. Very slowly, the frame judders into the air. It hangs there for a few seconds, then crashes to the floor and shatters.

"_Reparo_," I say, almost a reflex. "What was _that_?"

"I'm losing my magic," Nott says quietly. "I couldn't admit it to myself for a long time. I still don't want anyone to know. You're the first person I've told and I'm only telling you now because I know it's all connected."

"What's connected?" I say.

"Everything!" says Nott sharply, irritated. "It's been happening since I watched her die. Faster… faster since I left school. I can't do anything anymore. I can still remember how to do the spells, exactly how it felt to do them, but when it comes to it, there's no power left. My magic is almost gone."

I think of Tonks in my sixth year. "That can happen," I say, "when a witch or wizard gets very depressed. I take it that it only started happening after that night?"

"Since I've been able to see Thestrals, yes," Nott says. "It's been a slow decline."

"I remember," I say. "We had that Care of Magical Creatures lesson with Hagrid. Only three of us could see them – you, me, and Neville."

"I wondered how many people could usually see Thestrals in a class like that," Nott says.

"It did seem an unusually high proportion, even then, of people who could see Thestrals at the age of fifteen." Strangely, I recall with clarity Ron remarking upon it at the time.

"I wonder how many people in that class can see them now," Nott says, toneless and incurious.

"It wouldn't surprise me if it was everyone," I reply.

"We saw some horrific things in that war," Nott agrees. "On both sides. As far as I know Longbottom's grandfather died of natural causes, but neither of us would have seen death if it hadn't been for the Dark Lord, would we?"

"No, I suppose not," I say.

"I don't think anyone guessed that it wasn't my mother I'd seen die, but I was worried," Nott says. Despite the fact that we are sitting in my office at the Auror Headquarters in the Ministry of Magic, his tone is low, confidential. "I was very young when it happened. I thought someone must suspect that it was a murder I'd seen, my father was a Death Eater after all."

"I did wonder," I say. "Later. At the time we were all thinking about Umbridge and the way she was stacking her questions so as to get Hagrid sacked."

"Well, now you know," Nott's shoulders droop slightly. "Can I just ask you something, though? If you thought that… if you suspected… why didn't you do anything about it?"

"Well," I say, slightly taken aback. "It wasn't like I had anything conclusive to go on. It could have been anyone's death you saw, and it wasn't necessarily a murder. Even if it had been there was nothing to implicate you. When we investigated, after the war, your father already had been caught and punished and you had been questioned and released. We had no legitimate reason to detain you further."

We sit in silence for a moment, Nott pulling at a hangnail and me just watching him. Nott looks up and says abruptly, "Will it be in the papers, that I turned myself in?"

"I expect so," I say.

"You won't mention it, will you?" He asks, with a nervous toss of his head.

"Mention what?" I say.

"My… problem." He can barely get the words out. "I really don't want anyone else to know, but I knew I'd have to tell you."

"Of course not," I feel a slight stirring of guilt. There is no way I can guarantee that this information will stay out of the press, particularly if it comes up at the trial. But he is anxious and ashamed, and I want to set him at ease.

_A/N: Thanks for the reviews of the last chapter guys, very helpful. I kind of want to redo it now in the light of your comments because I think I can make it a whole lot better, but thought I'd put this chapter up first, hope you all enjoy it. Also, anyone else on Pottermore now? _


	12. Horace

Back to Hogwarts. What was I letting myself in for? Ah well, I thought, might as well be here than anywhere else these days. If the Death Eaters want to find you they surely will wherever you hide, but at least you'll be safer at Hogwarts with Dumbledore. And there were other advantages to being back. Harry Potter, for example. Now there's a connection worth making.

I arrived at the platform in good time, to get a good look at what was happening, you know. My eyes fell upon a strikingly handsome young man with a Slytherin tie: all high cheekbones and flawless dark skin. If he possessed an ounce of charm to go with his breathtaking appearance he'd certainly go far in life. I made my way over to him.

"Hello, young man. I don't suppose you could help an old teacher with his bags?"

"Certainly." He gracefully shrugged one shoulder and picked up a pair of my matching flowered carpet suitcases. As he helped me stow my luggage in a compartment we chatted about school, teachers and the Holyhead Harpies.

"Thank you so much." I said, when he had finished. "And what is your name, may I ask?"

"Blaise Zabini." He held out a hand for me to shake.

"You're a…sixth year?" I hazarded.

"Yes," replied the beautiful young man.

"Slytherin, obviously. A grand house. My own, actually, I was Head of House before I retired," I smiled. "But I'm sure Severus is doing an admirable job, I heard he was appointed after I left."

Blaise shrugged again.

"But who else have you got in your year?" I asked. "I say, do you know Aldous Nott's boy? Aldous was an old school chum of mine." I hadn't seen or spoken to him in years, but I had heard through various channels that Aldous had finally married and had a son. The wife had died some years ago, under quite fishy circumstances, but the son was probably Hogwarts age by now, I reckoned.

"You mean Theodore?" said Blaise.

"That's the one!" I cried.

"Yes, he's in my year," he said.

"I haven't seen Aldous in years. He's doing all right though, yes? Does Theodore talk about him much?"

"Theodore doesn't talk about anything much." Blaise seemed to think this funny. "But actually, Nott's father was caught at the Ministry at the end of last year, it was in the papers. He was hurt quite badly, I think. You'd have to ask Nott about it, though."

"Oh," I frowned. "Oh dear. Yes, I will have to make sure that I do that." Privately, I thought, I'll do nothing of the sort. And there's one name crossed off the invitation list for the Slug Club lunch on the train. It was a shame really, as I'd barely seen Aldous since our own school days despite having been close as teenagers, and I had been most eager to find out what he'd done since then and to get to know his son. But Aldous and I had clearly gone in different directions since leaving Hogwarts, and had different priorities, different loyalties. One thing I've learned over the years is that it doesn't do to get too involved in politics.

I didn't actually see Aldous' son until my first sixth year Potions lesson. Theodore. About the same height, same spare build; not a striking resemblance, but you could certainly see his father in him. The plainness of the Wilkes side of his family, however, was far more apparent in his face and mannerisms. I wondered how much his character was like his father's. Aldous, as I had known him, had been serious and studious, knowledgeable and quick to apply what he knew in innovative ways. I was terribly pleased for him when he was appointed to the Ministry's Experimental Magic division, and unsurprised to hear that he had been doing exceptionally well there. So a few years later when one of my students, a bright young man named Tom Riddle, began to display the same passion for magic, it seemed only natural to form an introduction…

Thank goodness I did not have long to dwell on this, as my thoughts were soon diverted by the delightful Miss Granger. Sometimes the Muggleborns do surprise you with how quick they are. I'm full of admiration for them. You can't expect them to be as good as us, not right away anyway. When you think that some of them had never even heard of Hogwarts or even our world at all, and they come here and from nothing make it their own – that, ladies and gentlemen, is impressive. There have always been plenty of Muggleborns in the Slug Club, and it makes me glad to think that I have been their connection to the people who matter in wizarding society. But still, not everyone is so enlightened.

Here I paused in my musings, which unbidden had found their way once more to the most gifted of my former pupils, raised in a Muggle orphanage. Dangerous ground. But it really wasn't my fault. Tom…a brilliant, brilliant boy…who could have thought he would maim himself like that? Yes, he made himself less than human. I thought I had told him it was pure evil. How could I have known he would actually attempt it? It was beyond anything I could have even _thought_…


	13. Minerva

There was a sharp rap at the door. I had not been settled in the Headmaster's office for even a week; it didn't feel like mine and I did not feel as though it ever would. In truth, I would have preferred to keep my old office on the Transfiguration corridor, but I felt it was essential to be here, to show that despite everything, Hogwarts still had a head, a purpose, and a future.

"Come in!" I called.

It was the last sixth year Sytherin boy. I'd arranged to see all of them after the Malfoy debacle and here was Theodore Nott, right on time.

"You wanted to see me, Professor?" he said. He seemed curious although a little confused; I had not explained the purpose of this meeting.

"Have a seat, Mr. Nott," I said. "Here, take some shortbread." I passed him my tartan tin.

"Thank you," he replied, taking a broken half finger. "But why…?"

"You may consider this Careers Advice," I said crisply.

"But Professor, I've had a Careers meeting already," said Nott. "Last year I talked to Professor Snape about being an Unspeakable and he said I'd need Potions, Defence Against the Dark Arts –"

"This will cover another… aspect," I said.

"What aspect, Professor?" he asked, innocently.

"Allow me to be blunt, Mr. Nott," I said. "In this last year He Who Must Not Be Named recruited a student from your house and I see no reason why he would stop just with Draco Malfoy. I am concerned that he may want to recruit you and I do not wish that to happen. I do not believe that it would be in your best interests, or anyone else's."

"No, Professor," he said. "I don't want to be a Death Eater."

There was something about the ready way in which he said it that made me suspicious.

"Of course, I may already be too late. Show me your wrists, please, Mr. Nott," I ordered.

"What?" he said.

"Your wrists, please, Mr. Nott."

He hesitated.

"I would like to see your forearms," I said. "Now." Aghast, he rolled up the sleeves of his robes to reveal thin, pale arms. The left had a jagged scar running down part of its length.

"How did you get this?" I asked, pointing at it.

"Oh, flying accident," he said. I was very suspicious; I had been thinking for a while now that You Know Who would develop some way to disguise the Dark Mark, as there were plainly great disadvantages to having his followers so branded. I ran a finger down the scar's length.

"_Revelio!_" I said.

I tried all the spells I knew on this scar to make it reveal its magical properties, non-verbally where the incantations would let me, as I didn't want to reveal the depth of my mistrust. However, I felt sure he was hiding something. Part of this could have been due to his house, as I'd had done with Slytherin. Severus's defection still felt like a personal betrayal. He had been a difficult person to get to know, but I'd thought that Quidditch banter aside, we'd developed a bit of a rapport. I'd enjoyed his bitter, ironic sense of humour, and when poor Sybil ventured down to the staff room, I confess that winding her up about her wretched Inner Eye was always more fun with Snape around, raising a sarcastic eyebrow every now and then: _A portent of great evil, right here in this teacup? Really Sybill, you don't say._ Of course, he must have felt like laughing in all of our faces. What was the point in trusting any of them when they can just turn around and betray you?

But as far as I could tell, this particular mark really was just cicatrized flesh.

"All right," I said in frustration. "Thank you, Mr. Nott. I appreciate your patience, and I know it can't be pleasant to be greeted with such suspicion. Have another biscuit." I passed him the tin again and this time he took a whole finger.

"Wait!" I cried. "One more thing. It's a risk, but it will prove… Touch it. Touch the mark with your other hand."

"It's a scar, professor, not a Mark," he said, but he put down his biscuit immediately and touched the scar with his index finger. Nothing happened. He looked up at me, hazel eyes wide and innocent, the same eyes as Haemon Wilkes, another former student, a Slytherin, and a fallen Death Eater.

"See," he said. "Professor, I'm telling the truth."

"Perhaps," I said. "But we can't take any chances. I hope you realize that it's not… personal."

"It is for some people," he said neutrally.

"May I ask to whom you are referring?" I said.

He looked surprised. "Malfoy, of course. And Potter."

"What do you mean, Nott?"

"Just that this fight is as much about personal grievances for them as anything else, isn't it?"

"You would know better than I."

Nott didn't say anything.

"This brings me to the second point I wanted to raise," I said. "I find it difficult to believe that Malfoy could have continued to perform his duties as a Death Eater for almost a full school year without raising even the slightest bit of suspicion in you."

"Professor, I had no idea," he said, a bit too quickly I thought.

"No hint of Dark activity?"

"None at all," he said.

_That'll be a first in Slytherin, _I thought, but aloud I said, "You've shared a dormitory with him for six years. I find it hard to believe that he wouldn't have told you."

"We are not close," he said. "Have you talked to Crabbe and Goyle? They might have known."

"I have," I said. "But that is beside the point. So you never noticed Malfoy acting strangely?"

"Oh, I knew he was acting _strangely_, all right," he said. "But he and Pansy, er… had a bit of a messy break-up this year, so I thought it was down to that."

"He did not exactly do things in an inconspicuous manner," I continued. "The necklace, the poison… you expect me to believe that you knew nothing about any of these wild schemes?"

"No, I didn't know, Professor," he said. I am a fairly accomplished Leglimens, at least when it comes to students, but I could not tell whether he was lying. "Had I had even the slightest suspicion I would have alerted a member of staff."

"You're certain? You never mentioned your suspicions to Professor Snape, perhaps…"

"Of course not, I had no idea what was happening."

"Not even the slightest inkling of what Malfoy was up to until this week?"

"None," he said, finally flaring with what seemed to be genuine anger. "How many times do I have to say it? But I suppose you knew that Professor Snape was planning to kill the headmaster?"

"That will do, Nott," I said. "Unless you'd like to start the next school year with a month's worth of detentions."

"But will there even be a school to go to next year?" said Nott sulkily. "I thought it was going to have to close…"

"I'm afraid, Nott," I said with a sigh, "that we are still as yet unsure as to whether Hogwarts will be able to reopen next year. Most of the staff, though, feel strongly that it should."

"Will they want to teach _me_?" he asked bluntly.

"I can't see why they wouldn't," I said evasively.

He glared at me. "I know what people are saying about me. Because of my father. I will come back if I can, but somehow I doubt that the Hogwarts staff will want me in their midst."

"You have always been a pleasure to teach, Nott," I said. "You're quick, conscientious and courteous. Just stay away from Dark Magic, and from You Know Who. Certainly as a magical stronghold you will likely be safer in this castle than almost anywhere else in the wizarding world, and I understand your wish to continue your education. You would certainly be welcome to come back if there is still a school to take you."

"And if not…" he said quietly, almost to himself. The thought of where he might go, what he might do if Hogwarts did not reopen in September hung there for a moment before I broke the silence.

"I don't mean to pry, Nott, but your father, he sustained heavy injuries at the Ministry a year ago, didn't he?"

"Yes," Nott said shortly. "He has yet to recover. He probably won't. But they were… compassionate. They didn't send him to Azkaban to die, but put him in a secure ward at St. Mungo's. I am not allowed to see him there, though."

"Naturally the concern is that you will be induced to follow in your father's footsteps," I said. "You do seem, forgive me, surrounded by You Know Who's allies. You stayed with the Malfoys last summer, did you not?"

"Yes," he said. "But I'm not going to stay there again. I'm of age now, I can do what I want."

"I think you should go away this summer," I said. "Take a tour."

"A tour?"

"Like the Grand Tour of the world wizards used to take. It would be a fantastic opportunity to learn about different cultures. And stay out of trouble."

"That would be the real reason for going, wouldn't it?"

"Well, yes," I said. "As long as you stayed on the move – you could use a variety of names – I think the Death Eaters would find it very hard to trace you. Make it difficult enough for them and I think they won't trouble to track you down, but here you are a sitting target. Stay and I am convinced they will try to recruit you; they want people with your kind of talent."

A confused smile curled at the corners of his lips, and I could see him wondering whether this was some oblique form of praise.

"May I have some time to think about this?" he asked.

"Certainly," I said.

"If I don't agree to this plan, this tour, what then?" he asked. "Will I be expelled?"

"What would you do instead?" I said.

"I don't know," he said. "I was just asking. And when I get back? What then?"

"Who can say?" I replied honestly. "These are dark times, very dark times indeed. But we are here to keep our students safe and you deserve that security as much as anyone, as long as you don't deliberately compromise it."

"I wouldn't, Professor."

"You will have the assistance of the Hogwarts staff should you find yourself in difficulty, Nott, remember that."

He nodded. "Professor? Did you offer this help to Crabbe and Goyle when they came in?"

I gave a humourless laugh. "They did not give me to understand that they were at all opposed to He Who Must Not Be Named taking over. Frankly, they will be lucky if they are allowed to return to Hogwarts."

"So instead you'll send them straight into the Dark Lord's hands?"

"There is only so much we can do," I said. "But help is here for you, Nott, if you want it."

"Thank you," he said, getting up. "That's more than Dumbledore ever did for us."

_A/N: Thanks for reading, if you got this far. Constructive criticicism is very much appreciated, and I do intend to go back and make improvements in the light of people's comments. I just reread the last four HP books (yay finally available in e-format), which provided some new inspiration for this story - including the idea for this chapter. I'd love to know what you think. _


	14. Vincent

Who cares that you failed your Defense Against the Dark Arts OWL when you can do the real thing? School sucked major arse until now. Headmaster Snape, with a bit of help from the Carrows, was finally teaching me something I could use. I turned my mind to today's lesson. It was the same as every lesson we'd had since the start of term: the Cruciatus Curse.

Turns out, I'm a natural at it.

There were a lot of people who needed the curse laid on them today, a lot of people who didn't know what was good for them. What do they think, that they can stop the Dark Lord? He's got powers they can't even imagine, I know that and I haven't even got my Mark yet. Wish I did, then I wouldn't be stuck here, I'd be out actually doing stuff like Draco. God, Draco was such a prick last year about being the first one to get the Mark. And swearing revenge on Potter for getting his dad put away, like he was the only one or something. I was good and pissed off about Dad being sent to Azkaban too, and I know I didn't get the best O.W.L.s, but Draco didn't either, I don't know how he got to be the one with the Mark on his arm.

I'd have thought the Dark Lord would have wanted Nott before Draco any day, and Nott's father probably won't live to get out of his bed in St. Mungo's, so Nott's got more reason than any of us to join. Although, to be honest, he's been a bit shit lately, maybe he's smart but he's obviously a total pussy. Dark stuff really does sort the hippogriffs from the hippopotamuses. At the end of the day, it just shows that I am a better wizard than him, and once we all get the Mark, it'll be obvious who's the most valuable to the Dark Lord. I'm gonna include Draco in that, too. OK, so maybe I did have to resit my damn Defense Against the Dark Arts O.W.L., but I'd consider that a point of pride, really. Doesn't look good to be too great at the defense side of things, these days. I make shit happen, you know, I'm not the one mopping up the mess afterwards. Some of the Darker stuff, literally, you do need to clean up afterwards, but not Cruciatus, gotta love it, it's so _self-contained_. Still, I am looking forward to trying something else on these fuckers.

Longbottom was there again, but I've done him so many times it's starting to get boring, to be honest. He's a writher, not so much a screamer. Bones and Abbott though, not had them before, not personally, anyway. They might be fun. I didn't even know who I wanted today. Corner was there, and I knew he'd be ace because nobody'd seen him since the incident with the first year when he got caught, be good to be the first to have a crack at him after the Carrows. Bet he thinks he's a fucking hard man now, but I'll cut him down. I know I could make him weep like a little girl, I've got Cruciatus down so good. Bet they're sorry now, those prissy Ravenclaws, for all those troll jibes, I mean, no troll could do anything like this.

Turned out, there weren't enough bodies to work on for us all to have one each, so Professor Carrow put some of us with people who were crap at the curse, to teach them, like, and I was paired with Nott. Ha. Until now, for this kind of thing he was always the one trying to teach me, so this was a turn up for the books, you might say. Of course, Nott spent more time reading than he did talking to any of us. Well into books he was, the little swot. He would never let us copy his homework neither. He got dead snippy whenever Draco asked him about it, said he didn't see what was in it for him or why he should be the only one who bothered doing all the work. One time Draco got so fed up he stole Nott's homework from his bag for us all to copy, but he must of bewitched it or something because the next lesson we all got done for having the same wrong answers on our homework while Nott got full marks. How the fuck were we supposed to know that Vanished objects don't really go to Jupiter's seventh moon?

Nott had sloped off to the corner of the room, as far away from our subject as possible. We'd landed Longbottom again, boring.

"Oi!" I shouted at Nott. "Are you going to do the class work or what? Can't have you skiving off now, it wouldn't be right."

Reluctantly he moved in a bit closer, but he said nothing, and he'd not even taken his wand out of his pocket.

"_Crucio!_" I said, more to get us going than anything. I felt a thrill through my gut as I watched the pain spread across Longbottom's stupid face. The best part is, the more you enjoy it, the more it hurts them. But obviously you still need to practice.

"Come on, wand out," I said. "You're not going to get better if you don't even try."

Nott reached a hand into his robes and slowly drew out his wand, but still he said nothing.

"Now you," I prompted.

Nott swallowed. He was pale and shaking, and looked as if he might throw up.

"Just say the spell," I said, "and imagine Longbottom squirming like a little worm."

"I don't…"

"He deserves it. He had our dads put away and he's grassed on us Slytherins more times than I can even remember. Your father's still in St. Mungo's because of him and his friends. Think of that, and just do it." Merlin, it was so fucking simple.

"I know, I just…" He looked around wildly.

"Watch," I said. I demonstrated.

Suddenly Carrow was behind us.

"Come on lads, let's see what you've been up to."

I looked over at Nott, but he avoided my eyes. He obviously wasn't volunteering to go first. I stepped forwards.

"_Crucio!_" I bellowed.

Longbottom's face curled in agony. I could feel Carrow's approving eyes on me as I wound out the curse, watching a muscle spasm at Longbottom's temple before he finally let out a sound that was somewhere between a groan and a scream.

"Excellent," said Carrow. "There's a, whaddayacallit, _artistry_ to your work that's been developing beautifully over the course of this year. I look forward to getting you started on something a bit more challenging. But not everyone's at your level yet…" He looked pointedly at Nott. "Well, come on, boy, show me!"

Nott gripped his wand, faced Longbottom, opened his mouth…and hesitated.

"Do it!" shouted Carrow.

"Cruci-c-c-c-cru-cru-" Nott stammered.

"Get the bloody word out, boy, you're not even trying. Come on now."

"Cru-cr-_crucio_!" Nott managed to yelp out, looking relieved.

Longbottom didn't even twitch. Carrow kicked him.

"He couldn't even feel that! It's not just saying the incantation, how many times have we been through this? Now are you going to live up to your family name, Nott, or are we going to have to put you on the other side of these curses?"

"No!" Nott said quickly. "I'll do better, it's just… I'm… it's hard to… I'm finding it hard but I can do it, I can…"

There was a pause.

"Well, get on with it, then!" Carrow barked.

Nott tried again, "Cru-cr-cru-cruci-cr-"

"PATHETIC!" bellowed Carrow.

"Cru-cru-cru-" Nott's wand dropped limply by his side.

"Come on!" Here Carrow grabbed Nott's right hand, closing Nott's fingers in a firm grip around his wand. "Concentrate! Say the word, point your wand at the blood traitor, and picture him rolling around the floor in pain. It's not hard. You resolve yourself to do it, see in your mind's eye of the effect you're gonna cause, you feed and stoke the hate, you feel the spell rising up within you and then you just do it. Is that so hard? No! Now go!"

"C-c-cr-cruci-"

"Timing, boy! ONE, TWO, THREE, GO!"

"C-c-c-" This last attempt was even less successful than his previous efforts. Nott actually started retching. He clapped a hand over his mouth. When he had recovered he looked unwillingly up at Carrow. Maybe he did really think Carrow was going to use the Cruciatus on him, like that would help. No point in hurting a pureblood unnecessarily. It's not like he was deliberately rebelling, it's not his fault he's shit. It must have been pretty humiliating for him to have that happen in front of Longbottom and all the other sacks too. If it were down to him, they'd never learn their place.

"Self doubt. That's your problem, boy." Carrow said to Nott.

Nott stared at the floor and said nothing.

"Pity," Carrow continued. "Your father was one of the best in his day. It's hard to fix your type of weakness. You should be glad he can't see you now."

Nott kept looking at the floor. Carrow turned on his heel and walked away in disgust.

"Funny, innit?" I said. "You not being able to do the curse."

"Yeah," he said bitterly. "Really funny."

"You used to be quite good at magic, didncha?" I said.

He glared at me.

"Sure you're holding the right end of your wand, like? Not holding the tip and pointing with the handle?"

I laughed at him, and it felt good. The bell rang and Nott fled the classroom, face red, stuffing his wand in his bag. I gave Longbottom a good swift kicking and a final curse for good measure, and headed out myself.


	15. Harry & Theodire VI

"It was horrid, but in a way I'd expected it to be. A stuck pig will scream before it's slaughtered."

"That's all she was to you, an animal?" My voice is so harsh it surprises even me. Some of the Aurors, Fawley in particular, have perfected this confidential tone when they talk to suspects. Fawley manages to imply with his voice that he'd have loved to have seen whatever Dark magic they've done, that he's done some pretty Dark stuff himself, that even though he's an Auror now, maybe sometimes he still does... None of which is true, of course, but they usually open up and tell him everything. I can't do that, I just can't. I suppose from me it wouldn't be too convincing. Fortunately, Nott isn't silenced by the judgment in my voice: oddly, he seems animated by it, almost as though he thinks he deserves it.

"Have you ever actually seen the brutal death of an animal?" he asks. "My father had me practice on animals before, you know. That was unpleasant enough, but tolerable. I wanted to do well, to impress my father. I didn't know what was coming. The spells my father was teaching me, I found them… challenging," he says, running a hand distractedly through his unwashed hair. "They were difficult, that was the point of them. Blood everywhere, I…"

"Cruciatus doesn't do that," I say. "Nor Avada Kedavra."

"No," he says. "Both are useful, but my father wanted to give me knowledge that few others would have, old esoteric spells that combine well with others, useful for experimental magic. You may know some of the hybrids better, I know Antonin Dolohov had his own variant, and Sn–" he cuts himself off mid-word. "But you used it! _You_! You used _Sectumsempra_ on Draco Malfoy!"

And I am back in that awful bathroom flooded with water, watching the crimson bloom from Malfoy's pale form: red, red, redder than anything I'd seen my whole life. Nott looks slightly disconcerted, as though I have somehow been contaminated by this foul branch of magic, and now I know exactly what they are, the spells Nott used against some poor Muggle a decade ago.

"The Tribulus set," I say, slowly.

Nott nods. The spells of the Tribulus set are never used in battle; they are too slow and unwieldy. I've read quite a bit about them since the war, of course, but even among Dark wizards they are seldom used. They cause great damage to a human body on a minute level, burning through swathes of capillaries, tearing slivers of skin from muscle, corroding spots of viscera. However, they have to be inflicted gradually, with great determination, on a victim unable to fight back. In short, they are implements of torture, not weapons.

"They're horrible. I…I couldn't stop thinking about it…" Nott says, then adds offhandedly, "I did one of the spells, afterwards, on myself."

"What!" I exclaim. "Didn't you know how hard it would be to control?"

"I thought, just a little bit, I could stop it spreading…"

"But that's mad. Crazy."

"I suppose I wanted to see how much it hurt," he shrugs. "More than I could imagine, it turns out. I couldn't control the spread, so I did a lot more damage than I meant to. It was lucky I managed to staunch the bleeding when I did. I still have the scar." He extends his left forearm.

"But that's where you'd have been Marked," I say.

"Yeah," he shrugs. "Although I didn't think of that until afterwards. I'm right-handed, so it was just the easiest place." He laughs and I stare at him.

"What?"

"Nothing," he says. "It's just… when McGonagall questioned me at the end of sixth year, after Draco… well, she saw my scar I'm sure she thought it was a disguised Dark Mark. Or at least, she knew it could be, but she gave me the benefit of the doubt. I'm grateful to her for that. Actually, I think Professor McGonagall is the main reason I don't have a Dark Mark on my arm," Nott says.

"McGonagall?" My eyebrows rise. "Why? You weren't in her house."

"She suggested I go abroad for the summer between sixth and seventh year. I don't know what I would have done otherwise, but almost certainly nothing as sensible as that. It wasn't her advice though, that made such a difference. It was the fact that she was the first person who didn't assume that I was just going to become a Death Eater, that it was some sort of _fait accompli_. I'd decided I didn't want to be one of the Dark Lord's followers before then, of course, but I almost hadn't believed it possible that I could avoid it. McGonagall gave me hope.

"As it turned out, the Death Eaters did have plans for me, although I didn't know it until later, the end of that summer. I'd arranged it so that when I came back from travelling I'd only have to stay one night at the Leaky Cauldron before school started. But the Dark Lord must have had the place under constant surveillance, because I'd not been there half an hour when there was a knock at the door of my room.

"I hunched myself over and made myself look as small and weedy as possible," he says. "I know I still look like a teenager, a bit of a wrecked one maybe at this point, but definitely not someone you'd trust with anything important. It's useful. I like to avoid responsibility. So there was a knock, and I opened the door. It was Avery and McNair. They wanted to know where I'd been, why nobody had been able to find me all summer. I told them one version of the truth, that I'd been travelling and hadn't thought to let anyone know, it's not like I had anyone I was particularly close to.

"They said, did I know that the Dark Lord had taken over the Ministry and I said, no, because I literally just got back today, but glad to hear it! They asked if I felt guilty that all this had been achieved without my help and wasn't it really time I pledged my loyalty to the Dark Lord and took the Mark? They seemed ready to take me to him then and there, I was terrified. So I said, but I'm just a student, I'm still at Hogwarts, I'm not worthy to serve him yet. They tried to convince me that it was about my loyalty and the length of service to the Dark Lord rather than my skills, and said that they'd heard I was pretty handy with my spellwork anyway, but I just kept pushing the too humble to serve line because I knew the Dark Lord would prefer me qualified, and that this would buy me more time. I even tried to pass off the trip around Europe as a learning experience that would make me a better Death Eater, made out that I'd gone to the continent to uncover its esoteric Dark Arts. I'm not sure they bought that part, but eventually they left.

"I remember collapsing on my bed, panting like I'd just run all the way up the Astronomy Tower. They were gone, but it was only a temporary respite. I could probably keep them at bay until the end of the school year, provided there weren't too many casualties on our side. But after that… as long as you survived, as long as your supporters continued to wage war on the Dark Lord and his supporters, they would want me. The only thing that would let me off would be an outright victory, either yours or the Dark Lord's."

"Which were you hoping for?" I say.

"I knew I'd have a better quality of life if the Dark Lord won, but only if the opposition was completely crushed," he says, in such a matter of fact tone that you could forget that he was talking about my death, and the deaths of all my friends. He notices my revulsion and glares right back at me. "I told you, it's not been fun, the reception I get in most places these days for my connection to the Death Eaters. But I'd anticipated that."

He looks over at me, eyes pink-rimmed and weary. "Most of all I was hoping for a quick resolution."

"You got it," I say.

"Quick enough," he replies. "In that I never took the Mark, anyway. But that year at school was horrible. After I disgraced myself in my lessons with the Carrows with my feeble Cruciatus curse, I'd sort of thought there would be less pressure on me, but Carrow kept pestering me about doing remedial work, said he could believe how soft my father had brought me up. I put him off as long as I could, but I knew I couldn't keep him away forever, so I asked to learn something else."

"You never mastered the Cruciatus curse?"

"Not even close," he says. "I could sort of do it on animals at one point, but after… afterwards I couldn't even manage that."

"What did you learn instead?"

"Imperius."

"Another Unforgiveable,"

"It's not so bad," he says, defensively. "In the right circumstances…"

"There's a reason it's an Unforgiveable."

He looks at his hands.

"Did you like it better?" I ask.

"Much," he says shortly, and stops.

"Was the Imperius curse something you'd had experience with before?"

"Only on animals," he says. "Shrews, sparrows, gnomes, whatever I could find at home. I used them for other things as well, of course. My father… taught me a lot."

"Clearly," I say.

"As you probably know, there are many different shades to the Imperius curse; it can be very subtle. The one Moody made us try to fight off in fourth year, that was a very… crass version."

I lean forward and say softly, "What did you do, Theodore?"

His head snaps up. "What did you just call me?"

"Theodore. That's your name, isn't it?

"What is that, some kind of interrogation technique?"

"No," I say, although of course it was.

"No one calls me Theodore. You certainly don't."

"I'm sorry," I say. "I didn't mean to upset you. But you needn't make this more difficult for yourself than it has to be. I need to get the bottom of what happened that night, and whatever it takes, I will."

"I know," he says. "But I won't trust you if you're too nice to me. You're not my friend, and you shouldn't pretend to be."

_A/N: Thanks to everyone who reviewed, I feel really bad for taking so long to update, but I will do better next time, I swear! (Most of it's already written, but I want it to be perfect…)_


	16. Daphne

I'd had a hunch it would be tonight. Theodore and I were sitting on top of the Astronomy Tower alone together but as yet, it wasn't exactly what you'd call a date. I'd made him put on a cloak and scarf and then I'd dragged him up here, and I'd brought my portable wireless with us.

I wasn't exactly Potterwatch's target audience, but I'd overheard some Gryffindors talking in the toilets one day, and out of curiosity I'd tuned in. It had been a revelation. As a Slytherin, you're sort of cut off from the rest of the school, and you don't always get to hear the same rumours that everyone else does. A lot of strange and horrible things were happening, and while it might not have been as bad for people like me, of good family and in Slytherin house, it still terrified me. Even the some of the things we'd been made to do in lessons were awful. I knew I couldn't be the only Slytherin who thought this way, but it was hard to get at what people really thought behind their protective silences or their Voldemort-supporting bravado.

Though I knew his father was a Death Eater too, Theodore had never seemed like Malfoy or Crabbe. He always did things on his own terms, and I thought he should hear this, so I screwed up my courage and asked him. I'd sort of liked him for a while. So here we were, on top of the tower together. I'd not anticipated the steady drizzle that was now coming down. In my mind I'd sort of decided that we'd be listening to the radio huddled together against the cold under a shared cloak as the stars shone above us, but Theodore now stood, arms folded, watching me as I pressed buttons and twisted dials, trying to get the wretched thing to work.

"Albus," I said to it. "Albus… come on… Albus…"

"Daphne, what are you doing?" he asked.

"In a minute, I'm getting it to work…Albus… talk amongst yourselves, please… Albus…" I twiddled the tuner frantically, aware of Theodore's odd stare. "Albus… it's got to be tonight…Albus…"

"What's tonight?" said Theodore. "What is this about?"

"You'll see," I said. "When I get it working."

Finally I heard, faintly at first but growing louder, the voices I'd been searching for.

"Welcome to Potterwatch, this is River. We apologise for our temporary absence from the airwaves, which was due to a number of house-calls in our area by those charming Death Eaters."

"Daphne, what is this?" said Theodore, looking up at me in alarm.

"Just listen," I said.

"…now found ourselves another secure location and I'm pleased to tell you that two of our regular contributors have joined me here this evening. But before we hear from Royal and Romulus, let's take a moment to report those deaths that the Wizarding Wireless Network News and the Daily Prophet don't think important enough to mention. It is with great regret that we inform our listeners of the murders of Ted Tonks and Dirk Cresswell. It is believed that Muggle-born Dean Thomas and a second goblin, both believed to have been travelling with Tonks, Cresswell and Gornuk, may have escaped."

"Thomas?" said Theodore. "From our year?"

"Must be," I said. "He didn't come back this year, I knew he'd make a run for it, they all have, all the Muggleborns."

"They'd be stupid to stick around, that's for sure," Theodore agreed.

"But doesn't that sound like Lee Jordan? You know, the one who always did the Quidditch commentary."

"Yeah, maybe," Theodore said.

"If Dean is listening," said Lee Jordan's voice, "Or if anyone has any knowledge of his whereabouts, his parents and sisters are desperate for news."

I thought of my family, how frightened they'd be. I'd always thought Daddy was overprotective of me and Astoria for making us Floo him every single day, but our world is not a safe place to be and I suppose he must always have known that.

The announcer, whoever it was, continued. "Meanwhile, in Gaddley, a Muggle family of five has been found dead in their home–"

"Oh, God," I said. Theodore looked at me. He seemed to be waiting for something.

"All these people are dying," I said. "What can we do?"

"Do?" he repeated. "You want to do something?"

"Well, we can't just sit by with all this ghastly stuff happening, can we?"

He looked at me doubtfully, and for the first time I realized I might have been mistaken. "I'm not sure I understand what you're saying, Daphne," he said. "I hope you don't mean what I think you may mean."

My heart plummeted. I'd been so sure.

In the silence we could hear the announcer crackling through the radio again. "Members of the Order of the Phoenix inform me that it was the Killing Curse – more evidence, as if it were needed, of the fact that Muggle slaughter is becoming little more than a recreational sport under the new regime–"

"Shut it_ off!_" he hissed.

"All right, all right," I said, reaching for the dial.

In the silence, we stared at each other.

"I thought you were different," I said.

"No, not that different," he replied.

"But you always seemed so aloof from them, from Malfoy and that lot, and I thought… I thought you'd want to stop all these terrible things that are happening. I know you don't like the violence."

Theodore took a long, slow breath. He seemed to be deciding something. "I do want it all to stop," he said carefully.

I exhaled, relieved.

"I thought so," I said.

"But there's a big difference between wanting the violence to stop and actively resisting the Dark Lord, Daphne," he said.

"I know," I replied. "Trust me, I've thought about it."

"You're not going to do it, are you?" He seemed horrified by the very thought. This was not what I had expected.

"I don't know," I said. I didn't know what to think. I'd wanted to – of course I'd wanted to stand up for what I knew was right, even if it meant aligning myself with people my friends and family would look down on. But I'd not anticipated having to do it alone.

"Don't," said Theodore darkly. "It would be a mistake. You will open yourself up to the harshest recriminations. Everyone will consider you a traitor, and for whom? People who wouldn't trust you to hold their owl without poisoning it."

"This goes beyond inherited loyalties," I said. "They're right – we all have a duty to fight this evil."

"Things will get better…"

"Not on their own!"

"Look," said Theodore placidly. "This is the start of a new era… it's the hardest time. When things are more stable, it won't happen, things like this."

"More stable?" I exclaimed. "With that madman ruling us?"

"Once people learn to stop challenging the Dark Lord," he said, and a chill stole across my shoulders, "Then everything will be more calm, more normal."

"But they won't just go back to normal! Killing, torture, Muggle enslavement – those will be part of our world unless we do something now."

"Muggle isn't the same as magical," Theodore shrugged. "They're not like us."

I looked at him. "They're still people, Theodore. And they can't protect themselves."

"I know it," he said, rather aggressively. "But I don't see why we should be perpetually hiding from them. We have powers they can't even comprehend."

"So you're happy for whole families of innocent Muggles to be murdered?" I said.

"No!" Theodore almost shouted. "No, of course not! It's not a civilized thing to happen, it's horrible, it's wrong, but it happens for a reason. People are sick of bending our world around these stupid creatures."

"They asked for none of this," I said coldly. "They've no knowledge about what's going on and no ability to fight back. These murders are despicable, and they certainly shouldn't be just swept away or forgotten about."

"Daphne, I can't believe what you are saying!" Theodore cried. "You'll get yourself killed! How can you be so trusting? What if I told someone everything you'd just told me?"

"But you're not going to tell anyone, are you?" I said desperately.

"No," he replied. "But it was bloody stupid of you to so baldly state your feeling against the Dark Lord, Daphne. I hope you realize that because seeing you in trouble is the last thing I want. God knows it's been hard for all of us this year."

"You hate having to perform the Cruciatus, don't you?"

He laughed bitterly. "If I could perform it. It just gets stuck in my throat."

"Because it's vile."

"It's necessary."

I was horrified. "You think the Dark magic the Carrows are teaching us is necessary."

"They're teaching us curses that may save our lives," Theodore replied. "The Cruciatus is an unpleasant curse and I'll admit that I am finding it harder than I thought, but I can see why it's important. It is useful and yes, sometimes necessary."

"You're not going to join the Death Eaters, tell me you're not."

"No, why would I do that? Sign up to die in the Dark Lord's service?" he said. "No. The Nott line and the Wilkes line both will end if that happens. No, I'm not going to join the Death Eaters, if I can help it, and I'd rather not use the Cruciatus. But there's no way I'm sticking my neck out for Potter. You do what you want, but Merlin's beard, be _careful_. I just want to make it through this year unscathed."

We looked out at the village. The drizzle had slowed and it looked a lot like the romantic scenario I'd had in my mind all day, but I didn't feel the slightest bit giddy or excited now, but as though I'd experienced a small loss.

"What do you think is going to happen?" I said.

"Who knows?" he said. "I'm sure we've barely seen the tip of the resistance against the Dark Lord, I know we're in for some huge battles. Once they start fighting back I've no idea how it's going to go, but there'll be plenty of blood shed on both sides. We're best out of it, Daphne."

"I don't know if I can sit by and watch this happen," I said.

He looked back at me calmly. "Do what you have to do," he said. "But for Merlin's sake, _don't trust anyone_." He got up and started to climb back down the stairs, leaving me still looking out across the grounds, from the black sweep of the Forbidden Forest to the lonely glowing window of Hagrid's firelit cabin.


	17. Aberforth

The racket those kids made thundering through my pub, I'll never forget it. I'd had no idea Potter was going to try to evacuate them all that way. The whole bloody school. Probably just occurred to him on the spur of the moment, and now here they all were, spilling through Ariana's portrait: Gryffindors, Hufflepuffs, Ravenclaws, Slytherins. Well, Potter might have sent the entire school on an impromptu jaunt through Hogsmeade, but I can also make plans on the hoof, and right then I'd had an idea.

I can still pick out a Death Eater brat even among Slytherins, I just have a nose for them. And that was a useful skill back in those days, I can tell you. Features familiar from wanted posters repeated on schoolkids' faces, they'd come into my pub and order me around as if I were a house elf, as if the Slytherin scarves they wore were something to be proud of. Well, now they'd be sorry. But more importantly, they'd be _useful_.

The first Slytherin I collected was a girl wearing a flouncy satin bow that seemed at odds with her lean, calculating face - the spit of Jugson, I just knew she was one of his. She was older - fifth year, maybe. I grabbed her shoulders, Stunned her, and dragged her up a hidden passage. I had to hurry back down, because I knew the Slytherins were at the front of the evacuation. A third year boy, showing off to his mates - I turned him into a shoe. His friends got the message and scarpered. I picked up the shoe, kicked it into the passage, transformed it back into a boy and froze him. Then there were some first years that I'm almost ashamed to admit I convinced to follow me by telling them I knew a faster way out of the castle, and then froze before they had time to realize they'd been caught in a trap.

I was going to call it a day at that point, but just then an older Slytherin kid came along and I thought, I'd better nab him too, that one's definitely Dark. I wasn't sure whose kid he was, but he looked familiar. I thought, there's no way he's not about to don a mask and join the battle, there's no way at that age you can hold your head up if you don't. He was walking along on his own, so he'd be easy to grab without people noticing. He was mousy and weedy and didn't look like much of a fighter, but you never can tell. You'd never think Snape would be one of You Know Who's best, but when you saw the way he could fling out those vile curses you'd forget how small and skinny and quiet he was. Stupid Albus, I'd thought, trusting him like that. So bloody self-indulgent, the way he airily declares his principles and then expects the rest of world to live up to them, that was typical of him, absolutely typical.

Once a gang of Ravenclaws had run past I made my move, hitting the skinny Slytherin with an Impediment Jinx and then Disarming him. I bustled him down to a side corridor while he was too weak to resist, hoping that nobody would notice. There are advantages to chaos and confusion. Then it was just a case of making sure he couldn't move, and floating him up the secret passage.

It took me a while to drag all the kids up to the other mouth of the passage, but it led to a deserted part of the castle. I had to find a place I could keep these students locked down where nobody would find them. Emerging on the third floor, I decided to take them to Filch's office, and lock them all in there. I took the older boy first; I left him with the Full Body Bind on and tied him up in thick ropes too for good measure. I dragged the other kids in, gave them the same treatment and then locked the door with three separate spells. What could we do with these Slytherins, how could we turn them from a liability into an asset? I went to find Potter. He'd know how best to use them as leverage against the Death Eaters. Hell, he maybe even knew some of them personally.

It took me longer even than I thought it would to find Potter, though; the whole place was in an uproar. The walls and ceiling were shaking so badly that the air was getting thick with dust and debris. The Death Eaters would breach the castle's protective enchantments soon, no doubt about it. I suddenly saw him, sprinting down a corridor.

"Potter!"

I stood blocking his way ahead, my wand held ready. He was going to have to listen to what I had to say.

"I've had hundreds of kids thundering through my pub, Potter!" I yelled at him.

"I know, we're evacuating," Potter said, "Voldemort's - "

" - attacking because they haven't handed you over, yeah," I said, "I'm not deaf, the whole of Hogsmeade heard him. And it never occurred to you to keep a few Slytherins hostage? There are kids of Death Eaters you've just sent to safety. Wouldn't it have been a bit smarter to keep 'em here?"

"It wouldn't stop Voldemort," said Potter, "and your brother would never have done it."

That pissed me off. It was a good plan. And after all the trouble I'd gone to and all. But if Saint Albus wouldn't have approved, then of course we couldn't do it. But Potter was the one we were all rallying behind, and an army is lost without loyalty to its leader, so I legged it back anyway. I unlocked the office and went back in. Seven bodies stood tightly cocooned in rope, just as I'd left them, propped against the wall like gigantic rigid maggots. I wasn't sure how best to handle this situation, but I took heart from the fact that most of the kids barely reached chest height.

"_Finite incantatem_," I said, and the ropes fell away. "You're free to go."

"Excuse me?" said the mousy seventh year incredulously, as he staggered up.

"Go," I said. "You've no business here."

"No business?" he snapped. "We didn't have much of a choice about that, did we?"

"I think you all should leave now," I said.

"Give me back my wand!" he said furiously.

"Not with that attitude," I replied swiftly. "Now come on, all of you."

"Why should we do what you say?" the hard-faced Slytherin girl said aggressively, with an insolent jut to her chin. "What are you going to do, kill us?"

"Going out there unarmed would be suicide," said the mousy boy. "We won't do it."

"You'll do what I tell you," I said dangerously. "I overpowered you. I have your wand."

"It wasn't a fair fight," said the hard-faced Jugson girl. "You attacked me when my back was turned."

"Funny how you lot care about fighting fair now, isn't it?" I said sarcastically.

"You're no better than the Death Eaters," said the girl scornfully. "Despite what you pretend."

"Do you think we haven't worked out what you wanted with us?" the older boy jeered. "You were going to use us as hostages, but obviously that's gone south."

"There's been a change of plan," I said. "So what? We don't need you anymore. Off you go."

"If you don't want me here," the mousy boy said, "Then I'm staying. You'll have to make me leave."

"Look, kid, I don't care what you do. Potter says I can't keep you here, so it's none of my business where you go. Just piss off, the lot of you. You hang round here and aid the enemy, you'll be killed and no mistake."

"Great," the mousy Slytherin said. "That's really great. You've illegally detained us when we've done nothing wrong, kept us immobilized in what is currently the most dangerous location in the wizarding world and now that hasn't gone to plan you're telling us to walk out into a battlefield, without wands, where it will immediately be assumed that we've stayed of our own volition to join the Death Eaters and bring down the school. Thanks a lot." Cheeky little sod, I thought. His lot are ripping apart the wizarding world as we speak and he only cares about his personal safety.

"What do you want me to do about it?" I said.

"You're going give us our wands back, and then you're going to escort us to an escape route and make sure no one attacks us as we leave," replied Mouse Boy.

"Oh, am I?" This boy had some nerve. "There's a battle going on!"

"Yeah, and we want to get out alive!" shouted the hard-faced girl.

"Why should I help you out?" I said.

"You kidnapped us." Hard Face replied balefully.

"Look," said Mouse Boy. "You can think of it as your opportunity to make sure we really do leave. Because if I don't get my wand back, I for one am staying right here."

I looked from the girl, seething, terrified but determined, to the boy: placid, arrogant, indifferent. He looked pointedly at some of the scabby little first years.

"You're a real hero," he said. "Tackling these twelve-year-olds. Want to check they're not Marked before you let them go?"

"All right," I said, ignoring him. "I will take you as far as the fifth floor. You know where the Room of Requirement is?"

"Yes," said Mouse Boy. "But where are your fighters stationed? How do we know we won't get attacked when you leave us?"

"I can't tell you where they are," I replied irritably. "You might use that information to aid the enemy."

"Just to stay safe!" screamed Hard Face. "None of us asked for this, you know."

"I'll lead you through the fighting, don't you worry," I said. "Got to keep an eye on you anyhow. Upper corridors are more or less deserted. But I mean what I said. I see any of you again tonight you will not live to pass on your precious pure blood."

"Fine," said Mouse Boy. "Just give us our wands, and get us out of here."

Sighing, I took their wands out of my pocket and held them out in my fist, with my own raised, ready in case they tried anything.

"You go ahead of me. And you," I said, gesturing at Hard Face. "I want you both where I can see you. The rest of you, come on."

We trooped out, me covering the two older kids with my wand. They had theirs out too, as did the twelve-year-olds. I didn't like that, but I didn't think I could make them put their wands away. What wizard would do it, in a situation like this? The last thing I wanted was to undermine my own authority any more by giving them orders I knew they wouldn't obey.

From the screams below I could tell the fighting had spread. We'd have to walk through the edge of the battle at least to get to the Room of Requirement. We rounded the corner and I could see the kids' eyes widen as they saw the giant. Bits of debris were falling now and there were endless flashes of green and red. A red-haired girl sent a well-aimed jinx into the crowd below.

"Good girl!" I yelled. Do them good to see that, these scummy little Slytherins. I'd have them off my hands soon enough, and then I'd be able to join the battle proper. "They look like they might be breaching the North Battlements, they've brought giants of their own!"

Suddenly Tonks was alongside me. "Have you seen Remus?" she called as I sped past.

"He was dueling Dolohov," I shouted back. "Haven't seen him since!"

"Tonks," The red-haired girl tried to hold her back, "Tonks, I'm sure he's OK-"

"Where, Aberforth?" said Tonks, panicked now. She had joined the little procession of Slytherins and was bouncing along beside them, her face alive with worry.

I could see Mouse Boy and Hard Face listening. "Get out of it!" I yelled at them.

"Who are these kids?" asked Tonks, looking round at them for the first time. "Where are you taking them?"

"Out," I said shortly. "Take a good look at them, because they're not supposed to be here and they know it. If you see them around once I've got rid of them you can take it as a given that they're up to no good. Use any means necessary at that point."

"I dunno, Aberforth," said Tonks, doubtfully. "They seem pretty young…"

"All kids of Death Eaters," I said. "You have no idea what they're capable of."

At my words Tonks' eyes had lit up, and she addressed the kids. "Maybe you know? Have you seen him, do you know where he is? Remus? Professor Lupin, remember him? He taught Defense Against the Dark Arts here…" she looked over the first year kids, who stared back blankly, "…but you're too young, you won't remember."

"They haven't got any information, they haven't even been near the battle," I said. "And it's going to stay that way." Here I looked over at Hard Face and Mouse Boy in particular. "But I last saw Remus backing Dolohov down that corridor. Tonks, _Tonks!_ -" I shouted after her, but she was already sprinting away. "He can look after himself. He's going to be fine."

_A/N: A lot of this was actually taken from the book. I think it's interesting that despite Harry jumping to conclusions about Malfoy and Snape and his use of Unforgivables against the Death Eaters, he's unambiguously against the use of Slytherin hostages._


	18. Harry & Theodore VII

"My father told me to dispose of her things. She had a bag of books, which surprised me; I had not thought about Muggles reading before. They were titles I did not recognize, strange and bleak: _Wuthering Heights_, _Absalom, Absalom!_, _The Sound and the Fury_, _Repetition and Revenge_. I was supposed to destroy them, but I didn't. There was something about them that piqued my curiosity. So I read one. And then I read them all."

He pauses and looks at me. His eye contact is hesitant, nervous,

"You read Muggle books?" I say in the silence. "Why?"

"I don't know," he replies. "That could have been the worst mistake of my life, in the light of what I'd already done. They were brilliant. I had no idea that Muggles had any insight or intensity of feeling at all, and these books… there was no magic in them, none at all, but every word was true. And I realized that she had read them, and probably loved them too, because she had written in her notebook about them, notes for an essay it looked like."

"What did you do after that?"

"There was nothing I could do," he says. "She was dead - all that was gone. I hadn't known what we'd done, not really, until then."

"And the books? " I ask. "What did you do with them?"

"I kept them - I still have them now. You'll want them, I suppose, as evidence?" he asks.

"Undoubtedly," I say.

"Will you keep them?"

"For a time," I say.

"Then afterwards?"

"I don't know," I say. "Maybe keep them indefinitely. Maybe destroy them. Maybe return them to her family. Why?"

There is a pause and I realize something. "Oh. You wanted to keep them, didn't you?"

He nods miserably.

"Out of the question. Nobody would stand for it," I tell him.

"You don't know what they mean to me," he begins, but I cut him off.

"Look, there's no way anyone's going to let a young Dark wizard keep any kind of trophy from his victim. That's just how it is."

"They're not trophies," he says flatly.

"No?" I say. "Who'd believe it?"

He has no response.

"You can still read those books, if it's something you feel you have to do," I say. I wasn't sure I understood this strange compulsion. "But it would have to be other editions."

"Maybe," he says.

"It seems odd," I say carefully. "That you would be interested in them."

He shrugs. "I was just curious, and they weren't what I expected. But then I had barely been exposed to the Muggle world."

"I can imagine."

"I've read other Muggle books since then, not that many, just whatever I could find without venturing too far into the Muggle world. Some of them were pretty bad, not like the ones she had, but some of the others… Even when I read the bad ones, though, despite the fact that they were ridiculously contrived and clumsily written, I was astounded by what they showed me - how big the Muggle world was, how self-sufficient. And then it dawned on me that it was me who was irrelevant, that I knew about Muggles, but for them, we might as well not exist. There's so many of them, and we are so few."

"Didn't you know that?"

"Not… not really. I guess I never really thought about how many Muggles it takes to make a city. A million didn't mean anything to me, but now it does. I walk down the street and I never see the same Muggle twice. They will overwhelm us. Through simple strength in numbers, they will overwhelm us. Our population has scarcely stayed steady, whilst theirs has erupted."

"And that frightens you?"

"Of course. An outpouring of mediocrity, too stupid to even be aware that we're here but they'd kill us all if they knew we existed. And what am I?" he said bitterly. "I'm not even properly magical anymore."

"You've still got some magic," I say. I would like to establish what he has left.

He twitches irritably. "Barely any."

"What can you still do?"

"Nothing physical. Transfiguration's completely gone. Charms – getting that way too. Larger objects now, it's just… forget about it."

"So you haven't lost all your magic at the same rate?" I ask.

"No, I told you I can still do Occlumency. That kind of spell… I've managed to do OK, even up until quite recently."

"How recently?"

"A couple of months ago," Nott says. "Blaise - Zabini, you know - was asking me questions and I… I didn't want him to know all this… but it was harder, I couldn't look him in the eye and lie. He knows me."

"Are you using Occlumency now?"

"No. Merlin, of course not. What would be the point in lying now?"

"The truth could be worse," I say.

He gives a humourless chuckle. "Isn't it bad enough already? Anyway, you're going to be questioning me under Veritaserum, aren't you?"

"My colleagues and I may want to do that, yes," I say. "But you must know as well as I do that it's possible to use Occlumency to negate the effects of the potion."

"It's harder than you think," Nott says shortly. "I'm not sure I could do it now." His voice is cracked; I conjure a glass and pour him some water.

"You've tried, then?"

"Slytherin drinking game," Nott replies. "Malfoy forced me. I'm not sure where he got the potion from, but it was strong. Shortly after that I decided to stop going down to the Common Room to read."

"Merlin's beard," I say. "I'm glad I wasn't in Slytherin."

He nods. "It was tough, but you learn a lot. And not just Ravenclaw fact knowledge, stuff you can actually use."

"So that's what you've kept the longest," I say, "Occlumency? And Legilimency?"

"A bit, yeah," he says. "Things like Cheering Charms are OK too. It's physical magic I really have a problem with."

"So you can still do magic of the mind?" I ask.

"Sort of," he says. "I told you though, it's getting harder."

"Have you used the Imperius Curse since your seventh year at Hogwarts?"

Nott is silent. He dips his fingers into the glass, watching the water's surface ripple.

"Did it occur to you that you could use another wizard as a proxy to perform the spells you were now incapable of doing yourself?"

Nott still doesn't say anything; I keep staring at him. He slams his hand down on the desk and water splashes across the table.

"Of course it occurred to me!" he bursts out suddenly.

"You used that principle, didn't you?" I press.

"No," says Nott, not meeting my eye. "Well, only when I had to…"

I press for an answer. "How often?"

"Only when there was something I needed to do," he says evasively.

"Like what?"

"Do you know how hard it is, not having magic? Things that were once easy are now impossible."

"Come on, I need some details now."

Nott shifts in his seat, embarrassed. "Well, I had to wash somehow, you know."

"What?"

"I don't have access to running water, what was I supposed to do?"

I stare at him. From his tone of voice I can tell that he genuinely doesn't understand what is wrong with overcoming the will of strangers to attend to one's personal hygiene. I'm also astounded that in a city with millions of sinks, showers and baths, this is his solution to the problem of getting clean; for the first time I realize how ill-equipped he is to deal with life without magic.

"Who did you use?" I say casually.

"Nobody I knew. Mostly customers who came in to the shop, late in the evening when I was alone on the floor, just before we closed. I could usually tell if someone would be susceptible."

"Every day?"

"Most days," he says. "Really it depended on opportunity."

"You'd do it then and there?"

"The first part, yes," he says. "Generally I'd get them to wait outside the shop for me and we'd go somewhere more private."

"And what else would you get them to do?"

"Nothing like that!" says Nott, looking properly shocked. "Merlin! No, I…"

"We see everything here in this department," I say. "I had to ask." Not that I'll necessarily take his denial as the truth, of course.


	19. Montse

Extreme measures are more forgivable if you're on the side of the victors. My side was the wrong one, but it had been chosen for me a long time before I was born. I grew up with whispers behind me and the silent support of a long absent Dark Lord implicit in all of my interactions with other Hogwarts students. I spent the first few hours of the Dark Lord's last battle locked in a History of Magic classroom with half a dozen other Death Eaters' children - Aberforth Dumbledore had had the bright idea of holding us all to ransom.

In the confusion of the mass exodus, Aberforth had picked each of us off, freezing us with the Full Body Bind. Needless to say, his hare-brained scheme didn't pan out like he wanted and the twelve of us were let loose in the middle of the battle of the century, finally free to leave but with no escape route left to us. People might have certain ideas about us, but for the most part we were pitiful really, a bunch of kids. Besides me, the only student who was even O.W.L. age or over was Theodore Nott. I hadn't known him very well at all, although you'd sometimes see him lounging in an alcove by the fire in our common room, reading, or sitting at the edge of Malfoy's gang as they discussed the morning news at the breakfast table, meticulously spreading damson jam on his toast and smirking to himself. I've barely seen him since that night, but there's something about being in mortal danger together to make you feel as though you know someone well.

We'd made a run for it down the corridor to the Room of Requirement, but when we got there, nothing. There was nowhere to go. A Hufflepuff girl, first or second year by the look of her, was standing at the wall where the entrance should have been, beating it with her fists.

"Let me in! Let me through!" She was practically hysterical. "It's shut! They've closed down the entrance! "

"Oh for fuck's sake," I said, shoving her roughly aside. She was right though; there was no way in. "But this was definitely the place, though, wasn't it?" I looked over at Nott.

"Yeah," he said. "The Room of Requirement. I heard Pomfrey telling Filch where it was, and I remember Malfoy spent a lot of time here last year."

"Have you been inside it before?"

"Not exactly…"

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"No," Nott said. "It means no, I've never been here before. Are you happy?"

"How can you be sure this is the place, then?"

"I'm not mistaken, Montse," he said flatly.

"I suppose if that little Hufflepuff thinks it's here, it probably is. But why can't we get out?"

Nott ran a hand over the rough stone wall. "I reckon it must have been sealed to prevent any more movement between the school and the village," he said thoughtfully. "A good strategic move on their part, as it's now more of a liability to them than an asset, having it open."

I thought about suggesting making a run for it, just me and Nott, finding some other escape route out of the castle and across the grounds, leaving the others with the crying Hufflepuff girl to be rescued. They were too little for anyone to bother with really; they'd be fine. I knew that as the eldest Nott and I were the most likely to be taken for Death Eaters, and were therefore in the most danger. We'd be faster on our own and would stand the best chance of making it out without the kids. But then Roderick Rowle, a delicate-looking first year, burst into tears. He had walked with a limp since (I knew) he had been savaged by a manticore at the age of nine whilst on holiday in Turkey. Our families were friends. There was no way I could leave him, or any of them, when I looked at their teary red eyes, their runny noses, the large toad clutched desperately in a girl's hands, the only thing she'd thought to bring.

"Where shall we go?" said little Sebastian Avery in a plaintive voice.

"Away from the fighting, but not somewhere we might get trapped," I said.

Nott gave me an appraising look. "The attack is concentrated at the North Battlements right now, that bloke said."

"Sure you don't want to join the battle?" I asked.

Nott stared at me. "Quite sure," he said coolly.

"You're that convinced that the Dark Lord will triumph even without your help?" I said.

"You know as well as I do that it's not obvious who will win this battle, although it does seem that it will be decisive," he replied. "While naturally I am hoping for the Dark Lord's victory, I do understand the value of keeping one's options… open. But I see you're not volunteering to fight for him either."

"I'm just a girl," I said.

He laughed. "Of course. You can say that, and maybe some would believe you, but we both know you're perfectly capable of joining the battle if you wanted to. There are girls your age fighting on the other side."

"So I'm as much of a coward as you, is what you're saying," I said.

"You can frame it like that if you wish, but I prefer to think of us as pragmatists," he said.

"What will your dad say?"

"There's not a lot he can say. He's still in St. Mungo's and I have not been allowed to visit him. Even if that were to change, I have been told that he is very sickly – barely able to speak most of the time."

"Oh god," I said. "I'm sorry."

"Don't feel too bad," replied Nott. "I have been told that he is as comfortable as one might hope. And at least I have nothing further to fear. Is your father here tonight?"

"Almost certainly," I said. This was something I did not want to think about; in my mind the person in the Death Eater mask was not Dad. The mask was like armour, protecting him from harm, but it was more than that too. What was done in the mask was separate. It was not part of who we were.

"Are you OK, Montse?"

"Yeah, I'm fine," I said. I'd been silent for a little too long. "I just want us all to make it out of here alive."

He nodded approvingly. "I thought you had some sense. If we go down to the ground floor we should be able to keep several escape options open."

"Then what?" I said.

The girl was still crying. _Just pull yourself together,_ I wanted to say to her. _As bad as things are for you, they're worse for us. _

Aloud I said, "You girl… Hufflepuff... what's your name?"

She let out a muffled squeak.

"You're not afraid of us, are you?"

At this, the girl looked too frightened to breathe.

"We're in this together now," I said, trying to comfort her. "We're making a plan and we'll get out of this, don't worry."

The girl said nothing.

"Montse, that's it!" Nott exclaimed.

"What?" I said.

He was looking at the girl's robes. "I think we should lie low in the Hufflepuff common room."

The girl looked horrified.

"What - why?" I said.

"It's near the kitchens, isn't it?

"Yes, but…"

"So it's on or near the ground floor," said Nott. "And much more secure than any classroom."

The girl finally spoke.

"But…" she whimpered. "You're not Hufflepuffs…"

"We all want to survive this," I said. "Nott's right, your common room is our best chance."

"Nott…" the girl whispered, mostly to herself.

Nott shot me a slightly alarmed glance; it was stupid of me to use his surname.

"I know who you are… you're all from Dark families. Death Eaters!"

Nott looked at me as if to say, _This could be a problem._

"Aren't you listening to us?" I said. "We're not fighting for him, and we don't want to die either! We've got to work together to survive this."

"I don't trust you," said the girl, her breath coming in panicky sobs.

"We're not going to hurt you," said Nott, quietly, shrugging at me because he knew how bad that sounded.

The girl opened her mouth; she was about to scream -

"_Silencio!_" I cried as Nott hit her with the Full Body Bind.

We could see her eyeballs whipping wildly around at all of us, her face full of terror and fury.

"Do you have any idea of the kind of danger we're in?" Nott hissed at me. "All it would take is for one person to have seen us and decided we're up to no good and we're done for, and now she knows who I am! It won't take much and they'll be able to send us down. With our families they'll be looking for evidence against us. I'm not going to Azkaban!"

"All right, all right, I'm sorry. Just keep your hair on." I jerked my head towards the girl. "What are we going to do with her?" I said.

"We've got to get her there," said Nott. "To the Hufflepuff Common Room, I mean. I do think it's our best chance. And then we've got to get her to let us in."

"How?"

"She'll know the password."

"I know, but you heard her, she's not going to tell us. How are you going to make her let us in?"

"You know there are ways," Nott said.

I stared. "You mean…?"

Nott nodded.

"Are you serious?"

"It's the only way," he said. "We've got to get in there."

"Are we going to carry her there like this?"

"Don't be silly," Nott said.

He knelt over the girl's prone form and took out his wand.

"_Imperio_," Nott whispered. The girl's tear-stained face relaxed. She sat up slowly. I was afraid the spell had failed until she suddenly stood, and slowly walked down the corridor. I didn't ask how he knew how to use the curse; I was just glad he did. I looked across at the younger kids and motioned them to follow. I could see that Nott was concentrating hard.

We all drifted behind him and the girl, afraid of disturbing his focus or awakening the girl from her trance. We skirted around the hall, edging round, trying to be as unnoticeable as possible. If anyone saw us, of course, they'd assume we were sneaking back to fight for the Dark Lord.

She led us to a stack of barrels, and stopped. This is it, I thought. Instead of saying the password, however, she started to tap out a rhythm on a barrel-top. It opened to reveal a rounded, burrow-like room, stuffy and close, the small circular windows barely letting in any of the still summer air. The whole thing was irrepressibly twee: burnished copper kettles, round barrel top doors, potted plants in _window boxes_ for Merlin's sake. There was stuff everywhere, clothes, broomsticks, books. Someone had even left a ukulele. Hufflepuffs had clearly been streaming out of the dormitories laden with possessions which they'd then quickly chosen to shed.

Nott collapsed on a fat yellow sofa across from the girl, who was sitting gingerly on an armchair. I assumed he'd deposited her there. The other Death Eater kids trooped in, eager to look round this unfamiliar Common Room. It was nothing like ours.

"Listen," Nott said, when we'd all sat down. "When it's over, if the Dark Lord triumphs, we will be fine. It won't matter if we are recognized as we leave here. If he fails, we will need to be more careful. In that case, I think we should put on Hufflepuff clothes - whatever we can find here - dirty our faces as though we were in battle, and sneak out in pairs."

"You think that will work?" I asked.

"I don't know," said Nott. "But I think it's our best chance. Do any of you have a better idea?"

"I don't," I said, after a moment's silence; the younger ones had nothing to say and clearly just wanted to be told what to do. "But we've got a while to think of one."

"What shall we do now?" said Nott. "I'm not sure how much longer I can keep her under for."

"You did really well," I told him. "You got us in here and that's the important thing. I'm sure we can handle her when she comes round."

"She's not going to know what happened, or why we're here," he said. "But let her think it was her idea."

"Okay," I said.

Nott closed his eyes and exhaled. A moment later, the Hufflepuff girl looked around, stunned.

"The Common Room?" she said.

We said nothing.

"Why am I here?" she said, a bit louder. "I thought… Why are _you_ here?"

"We're all safe," I said soothingly. "That's the important thing now."

"But how did you get in? You're _Slytherins._" The way she said it, like it was a swearword, really got my back up.

"It's jolly good we're here," I said. "We might have a chance of surviving this now. And you'd still be out in that corridor if it wasn't for us."

"Did I let you in?" she whimpered. Nott gave a curt nod over the top of her head.

"Yes," I said.

"What? Why?"

"You made the decision to let us in." I said.

"I did…?"

"It was very compassionate of you," Nott said.

"What have I done?" she moaned.

"We'll be safe down here," I told her.

She wasn't listening. She was rocking backwards and forwards on the squashy yellow sofa, sitting on her hands. "There hasn't been a breach in a thousand years…" she whimpered.

"We'll be safe here," I repeated.

We all heard a crash and running feet.

"We hope," Nott added, drily.

A voice, magically amplified, filled the room. "You have fought valiantly. Lord Voldemort knows how to value bravery. Yet you have sustained heavy losses. If you continue to resist me, you will all die, one by one. I do not wish this to happen. Every drop of magical blood spilled is a loss and a waste. Lord Voldemort is merciful. I command my forces to retreat, immediately. You have one hour. Dispose of your dead with dignity. Treat your injured. I speak now, Harry Potter, directly to you. You have permitted your friends to die for you rather than face me yourself. I shall wait for one hour in the Forbidden Forest. If, at the end of that hour, you have not come to me, have not given yourself up, then battle recommences. This time, I shall enter the fray myself, Harry Potter, and I shall find you, and I shall punish every last man, woman and child who has tried to conceal you from me. One hour."

The castle became still and silent.

"What's happening?" I said. "Do you think Potter is going to go to the Dark Lord?"

"I don't doubt it," said Nott. "He's always doing something foolhardy and stupid."

"Do you think he's the Chosen One?" I asked.

"Others think it," he said shortly. "So at least in a sense, it is true."

"But he was in your year before he left, wasn't he?" I said. "Was he good?"

Nott shook his head. "Average," he said. "Nothing more. I would hate to have my whole hope pinned on him, that's for sure."

"I believe in Harry Potter," piped a reedy little voice. It was the Hufflepuff girl. Since she had stopped crying we had all but forgotten she was there.

"What a beautiful sentiment," Nott said, sounding bored.

"I'm sure that makes all the difference," I added sarcastically.

"If enough people believe in him, Harry Potter will win!" the girl declared.

Nott raised his eyebrows. "You seem awfully confident," he said. "But Potter and I had lessons together for six years. He's really nothing special."

"He might not use the Dark arts," said the girl devoutly. "But he's still powerful and he's going to beat You Know Who."

"Not so afraid of us now, are you?" I said. "Declaring Potter, _Potter_, more powerful than the Dark Lord? People have been killed for less!"

"Go on, just kill me, then!" The girl threw back her head.

"Nobody's going to kill you," Nott said. "Nobody here, anyway. But be careful what you say. What's the point in you getting killed, for that?"

"I know what's right, and I'm proud to be on Harry Potter's side!"

"You're twelve," Nott said. "You don't know anything. Dying for a cause, it all sounds so bloody glorious until you realize that it's actually some trumped up story to make you the pawn of some megalomaniac who is never what he says he is, I don't care if you're talking about Dumbledore or the Dark Lord, and I'm sure Potter's just the same. The only real thing is the void you leave behind, the friends and family who need you, the life you never lived. Do you have parents?"

She nodded.

"Then shut up, keep your head down, and survive this for them. Don't just throw your life away."

The girl seemed struggling to say something. She glared at Nott, but if she wanted to argue with him, she never found the words. The next few hours were hellish. It was as if we were sitting in the midst of an apocalyptic thunderstorm, waiting for it to pass, not knowing whether the next explosion would cause the very room about us to collapse. There were screams and cries of pain, wails and moans. Nott sat, massaging his forehead with one hand.

"Headache?" I said.

"Something like that," he replied.

"How will we know when it's safe to leave here?" I said.

"I dunno," Nott said. "Just wait until things quieten down a bit, I guess. Whatever we do it'll be risky, but I don't fancy waiting here to discovered here by a load of Hufflepuffs either. Dealing with just the one is tedious enough. Let's go up to the dormitories now, and see what we can find."

The dormitories were just as cutesy as the Common Room had been. I hadn't been aware that there were that many patchwork quilts and granny squares in existence. Nott picked up a balled white garment; it was one of those funny Muggle shirts, with a round collar and short sleeves. It had a drawing of a weird yellow machine on it that gave me the creeps.

"Merlin, only a mudblood would wear this. They can't even spell 'beetles' properly," he said contemptuously.

"It's perfect," I said.

Roderick, meanwhile, had found a little handheld computer. "A Game Boy!" he said excitedly. "I've always wanted one of these!"

"How do you even know what one of those is?" I said. "Your mum would never let you have one."

"I know," he said sadly. "I met this kid on the Hogwarts Express who had a Game Boy, and I've wanted one ever since."

"You can skip the wizarding pride lecture," said Sebastian, cocky all of a sudden. "We've heard it plenty of times already."

A third year boy shook his head reprovingly, but no-one said anything. In that moment I realised that whatever the outcome of the battle, freeing ourselves from Muggle influence would continue to be an uphill struggle.

"Game Boys are so cool - look." Sebastian pressed one of the buttons.

"That won't work here," I said quickly. "Muggle stuff doesn't."

As if to prove me wrong, the thing flared into shrill electronic life. I hated it already.

"Awesome!" said Roderick happily, limping towards the stairs.

"You've got all the clothes you need?"

"Yes," came his voice from the stairway over the tinny music.

"God, are we going to have to listen to that all night?" said Nott gloomily. "I might have to see if anyone's hoarded some Firewhisky."

We had picked out what we were going to wear should the Death Eaters be defeated and had settled back in the Common Room when we heard the Dark Lord's voice again, echoing through the castle.

"Harry Potter is dead." The Dark Lords voice, high and shrill, sounded once more throughout the castle. Nott and I exchanged glances; the Hufflepuff girl's eyes widened fearfully. A few of the younger Slytherins whispered amongst themselves. Roderick continued to stare at the Game Boy, thumbs working madly, Sebastian peering over his shoulder.

"He was killed as he ran away, trying to save himself while you lay down your lives for him. We bring you his body as proof that your hero is gone. The battle is won. You have lost half of your fighters. My Death Eaters outnumber you and the Boy Who Lived is finished. There must be no more war. Anyone who continues to resist, man, woman or child, will be slaughtered, as will every member of their family. Come out of the castle, now, kneel before me, and you shall be spared. Your parents and children, your brothers and sisters will live, and be forgiven, and you will join me in the new world we shall build together."

"Nott?" I said. "Did you hear that? What are we going to do now?"

"Nothing," he said.

"But it's over," I said. "The Dark Lord has won."

"It's still dangerous for us," he said. "There will be at least one last upsurge of fighting, I guarantee it. What have Potter's followers got left to lose? Those closest to him will be killed, no matter what the Dark Lord says."

"Potter was running away? Do you believe that?"

"No," said Nott. "Potter would never have had the sense to run away. But even dead, Potter is a powerful symbol, and the Dark Lord must seek to destroy that. I doubt he will succeed entirely, though." His voice hardened. "He thinks we are fools."

"You think he's lying to us?"

"I'm sure of it," Nott said. "He knows we've seen how he manipulates perception, and he thinks he can try the same trick on us too. It couldn't be plainer, the contempt he has for us. And he expects us to die for him," he added bitterly.

So we waited. The _blip, blip, blip_ of the Game Boy was doing my head in. What kind of pureblood child openly uses something like that? I had to remind myself that there was still a non-negligible chance we would all die tonight. If that Game Boy made Roderick and Sebastian happy, then maybe it was okay. I just wished I'd put a silencing charm on the damn thing.

If this was my last night on Earth though, it was not ideal on many counts. The whole situation (being captured, escaping, fleeing danger) might even have been romantic if it had been with someone even reasonably attractive, and poor Theodore definitely wasn't, even if he was a good person to have around. Having all these kids tagging along didn't help either.

Nott had been right about staying put; the roaring of the crowd had started up again. There was a deep pounding noise that sounded like giants marching on Hogwarts, and for all we knew, there could have been.

I wondered where Dad was and what he was doing, even though I'd been trying not to think about him. From the sound of it, the battle was a particularly vicious one, and even though Potter was dead, there would still be casualties on our side. I didn't want to linger too long at the site of the battle when we left here; I might see something I regretted. When the time came, I'd suggest leaving Hogwarts as quickly as possible and going to our separate homes. There would be time enough to work out who was missing after the dust had cleared.

Before dawn it grew a bit quieter, although not quiet enough that we wanted to leave the sanctuary of the Common Room. Through the window I could see the sun lightening the sky before it rose, as though this was any other day. A nasal singsong voice sounded in the corridor beyond the barrel top door.

"We did it, we bashed them, wee Potter's the One, And Voldy's gone mouldy, so now let's have fun!"

"That's Peeves!" I said. "Do you think… has Potter won?"

"I can't see Peeves singing a song like that if he hasn't," Nott replied. "He knows which side his bread's buttered. Peeves makes a show of playing up to power, but he's not suicidal."

"So that means…?"

"We have to get out of here," he said tensely. "We have less time than we thought."

"Everyone put your Hufflepuff clothes don't have much time." I ordered. "And don't leave anything behind. "

Nott hesitated for a second and then self-consciously pulled off his pyjama top to reveal a white, skinny chest. I tried not too look, and for the most part succeeded; had it been Blaise Zabini I might have been more tempted. Embarrassed, he quickly pulled on the Muggle shirt. Although he was quite tall, the shirt was clearly made for someone who was wide as well, so it swamped him a bit. He nodded at the Hufflepuff girl.

"I'll put her under again," he said under his breath. "Easier to manage until we're sure we're safe."

The girl's face suddenly went blank and blissful and I knew that his Imperius was once again whispering thought her.

"Less resistance this time," he said to me.

I stopped Sebastian on his way out.

"Leave the Game Boy."

"But-"

"Leave it."

Reluctantly Sebastian removed it from the pocket of his Hufflepuff robes. I'd swapped my cloak for a dressing gown, as I'd noticed Muggleborns tended to wear them. A Slytherin wouldn't be caught dead in one, and this was a fact I was banking on to save my life. I'd shrunk down my cloak and put it in the pocket, though; it wouldn't do to leave any evidence we'd been here.

"How do I look?" I said.

Nott gave my outfit an appraising glance.

"Common," he said with a grin. He set fire to his pyjama top and watched it burn to nothing. "Let's go."


	20. Miriam

I shall not go a day without regretting my failure to recognize the swaying tentacles of the Devil's Snare, which killed a man under my watch, and in doing so took a choke hold of my career and my life. I am sorry, but to my mind I have paid for my mistake many times over. In some ways I do rue what followed more that the event itself.

The inquiry had occurred not a month before. It was ruled that although I should not be prosecuted for negligence, or lose my job, I had still been at fault. This put me in a strange kind of limbo. The hospital could not sack me without causing some outcry, but they no longer trusted me to perform my regular duties. The report had managed to imply that I was struggling to cope with my duties as a Healer, which I can only insist was absolutely untrue. Since Hogwarts I had planned my life around the pursuit of this most difficult and demanding of careers. Despite what some of the news reports said, especially a particularly nasty and pointed piece on supposedly generally falling standards at St. Mungo's by Rita Skeeter, I know I am an intelligent woman and I have always worked hard to give my patients the best care possible. I did not see the Devil's Snare. With an "Outstanding" N.E.W.T. Herbology result, it could hardly have been a failure to recognize the plant. No. Working the closed ward was laborious and repetitive, and I maintain that it was the lack of change and interest that let me look at that pot plant without seeing it for what it was.

Since my disgrace, I had become known as a well-meaning incompetent, who unfortunately had to be kept on the staff. I was given the most labour-intensive jobs, brainless and thankless. I had not worked hard all these years to become a bedpan cleaner, but there were many times that I felt scarcely above the St. Mungo's house elves. And yet, I felt I could not leave; I was ashamed. And then, I was given a new duty. It was not very interesting or important, but it did beat cleaning. A Death Eater had been brought in following a battle in the Department of Mysteries. He needed medical care, but the hospital administrators were reluctant to divert the overstretched attentions of Healers to this elderly man who had more demonstrably than most brought his injuries upon himself. Initially, seeing the man's frailty, I had thought this would be a very temporary arrangement, but it lasted, and lasted and lasted.

Two years that man lay in St. Mungo's, almost dead to the world, as You Know Who rose again and the decent part of our society fell into despair. Those killed by the Death Eaters numbered in the thousands and still the old man refused to die. He never really recovered from the injuries sustained from falling shelves and broken glass; they simply did not heal, and yet he never seemed to get worse either.

After You Know Who fell, the man's son was allowed to visit him once a month. I did not think that the father had been fully conscious for even a minute of any of these visits, but his son never missed a single one. He'd not been allowed to come in the first year of his father's detainment, as we'd been afraid the father would pass Dark secrets to the son. When the Ministry fell to the Dark side I'd thought he might try to visit and I wondered why he came now when he'd never bothered before. I'd known of his existence, but little more than that. I'd assumed that the son was an adult, probably comfortably into middle age, but when he finally did visit, he was much younger than I'd pictured him, barely seventeen.

The son would take out crumbling old hardbacks and read to the old man: _Ishmael __Maudsley __and the Mines of Madagascar_, _Curses and Cutlasses_, _The Enchanted Island_, all those old-fashioned wizard boys' adventure stories.

"I'm not sure he can hear you," I told the boy. The old man's eyelids fluttered and his breathing was slow and regular, if a little pained. I wasn't sure whether he was conscious or not.

"I want to read to him," the boy said. "He read these books to me when I was a child."

After that I didn't say anything.

Shortly afterwards I discovered that the boy had himself been detained on suspicion of being a Death Eater himself and then released due to lack of evidence. Lack of evidence. It's not the same as knowing he's not one of those criminals, is it? I was saying as much to one of the junior Healers in the staff room, and she replied that she thought someone in my position might have less strident views on the matter. Well! At least she said to my face what I know they're all thinking! But I wasn't the only one unhappy with the arrangement. Not everyone felt that these visiting privileges were warranted, a matter that had been debated by the staff when the boy had started visiting.

"He wasn't allowed in before, why is he allowed now?"

"He has been fully cleared of being a Death Eater. He has a right to visit his father."

"Who is a Death Eater himself!"

"There's no reason to think the son has been involved in Dark activities."

"Except he's Slytherin, I know that for a fact. There were other Slytherin boys caught aiding You Know Who. They should get rid of that house for good, it's a hotbed of Dark magic and violence."

"Innocent until proven guilty."

"That might be good enough for you…"

"How old is he? Seventeen? He can hardly be a hardened criminal."

"They raise them to kill people. They're not like our children."

He was certainly a dutiful son, Theodore Nott. Still he came even though his father had not said a word to him, had barely opened his eyes in all the times he had visited.

One afternoon I was sitting alone in the room with the old man, reading a novel, when he suddenly came to; his rare lucid periods had become shorter and much less frequent.

"Water!" he gasped, reaching for the shatterproof glass on the bedside table and gulping down its tepid contents.

"My boy…" the old man croaked, opening his gummy eyes. His eyelashes were matted with sleep and scum. "Where is my son?"

"I don't know," I said.

"He was here." The old man was agitated. He wiped blindly at his eyes.

"He was," I said. "But you were asleep."

"Theodore," he said. He had stopped struggling. "My poor Teddy boy…"

I said nothing. Clear liquid leaked from the old man's rheumy eyes.

"I should never have… he's not… he's too like his mother… "

Perhaps he could sense he was dying. He seemed to feel the need to say _something_, but it was as though he couldn't remember what. That was all he said. The following evening he passed into a coma, and three days later he was gone. After two years, I was almost sorry to see him go. Apart from anything else, I was now back to cleaning bedpans.

A couple of weeks later, I had almost got back into a routine, doing the rounds of the hospital's least glamorous tasks and contemplating other career options. I had stayed here long enough following my disgrace and, when I stopped to think of it, I could easily represent the guarding of a dangerous Death Eater as a skilled and demanding task when applying for new jobs. I had just begun drafting out a covering letter emphasizing the worthy and responsible nature of my position at the hospital when the Nott boy slipped past me, a bemused expression on his face. I turned around. My first impulse was to ask him what he was doing here; now that his father was dead, a boy like that had no business being around sick people. But bitter experience had taught me that it's always best to conceal one's suspicions.

"May I help you?" I said in a bright, friendly tone.

"Where's my father been moved to?" Theodore Nott asked.

"Moved?" I said, nonplussed.

"Yes, he's not in the room anymore," he said.

"But he's dead," I replied uncomprehendingly.

He blinked.

"What?"

"He died about two weeks ago," I said. "Didn't you get a letter?"

"No," he said.

"Oh." I couldn't think of anything else to say.

"When was the hospital planning to contact me?" he asked, an edge to his voice now.

"That's really not my area," I said. "I thought an administrator would have contacted you."

"Quite." said the Nott boy stiffly. "Where are his remains? I will need to have him buried on the family plot."

"Oh," I said. "I think I'd better see if there's someone you might be able to talk to…"

"Tell me," the boy said. "You know what happened." It wasn't a question. It was as though he knew that I did know.

"Well," I said. "I'm not sure it's really appropriate, under the circumstances…"

"Tell me," he said again, more heatedly this time. "Where is he now?"

"He was taken to the morgue in the basement," I said, deciding that I would just tell him the truth. "Until the decision was taken to magically cremate him. That's been St. Mungo's policy since Inferi were reported during the war. Families have been very worried that their loved ones may be used for such a purpose and..."

"Why wasn't I informed?" His voice was cold.

"I didn't know you hadn't been told," I said. "We notified the Ministry, and I assumed that they would pass this information on to you. I'm sorry."

He sat heavily in one of the chairs lining the corridor.

"I'm sorry," I said again. "Is there anything I can get you?"

He looked surprised. "Don't trouble yourself. I expect you have things to be getting back to…" he said. This was true: I had been instructed to go through the laundry. But I was not in a hurry to be getting back to _that_.

"Here…" I sat next to him and conjured up a pot of tea and two cups.

"Thank you," he said, pouring himself a cup and adding a large glug of milk. "But you needn't be so kind. Really. Most people aren't, especially not… these days."

"Oh," I said. I felt sorry for him. I had thought maybe if I spoke to him about his father…not prying, exactly, but after all I had guarded the father for two years and it frustrated me that I still knew next to nothing about the family. Now I felt a little guilty. I said, "I'm always surprised by how much difference a cup of tea can make."

"Yes." He smiled sadly. "Professor Snape gave us tea the night our fathers were caught at the Ministry," he said. "Cushions bad news, I guess."

"'Us'?" I said.

"Malfoy, Crabbe, and me," he replied. Those were names I knew; everyone knew them. The Malfoys and Boris Crabbe were due to be tried at the end of the summer. Vincent Crabbe, Boris's son, was dead, killed in the final battle.

"Your father knew he was going," I said. "He was at peace." It was sort of true.

"Did he say anything about me?"

"He wanted to see you. He knew you were here."

"Good," the boy said. "I'm glad. It was worth coming, then."

I thought about telling him what his father had said to me, but I couldn't remember the exact words I didn't think I'd be able to get across the urgency of what he'd been trying to tell me.


End file.
